


Until We Meet Below

by Copper_Nails (Her_Madjesty)



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pirate, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/M, Kylo-typical violence, M/M, Pining, Pirate-typical violence, Pirates, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-13
Updated: 2016-11-29
Packaged: 2018-08-22 04:54:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 53,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8273678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Her_Madjesty/pseuds/Copper_Nails
Summary: In an attempt to escape from the grasp of Unklar Plutt, Rey finds herself aboard the Finalizer and serving under the most notorious pirate in the New World: Kylo Ren.





	1. Arc I, Chapter 01: Rey

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally meant to be my Reylo Big Bang piece, but then...it spiraled out of control. I wrote the first draft in about four days, and it has taken several months to work it into something presentable. Sophiascribbling had much to do with that effort, and I am forever grateful.
> 
> That said, I desperately hope you like what I have in store for you. XOXO

Rey wakes to the smell of saltwater burning through her nose. She chokes, wincing as her body complains at being stuffed between a barrelful of salted cod and the hull of an Old World trading ship. Her muscles quiver as she shifts positions; she can’t remember the last time she stood up straight, let alone the last time she saw the sun.

There’s a flurry of shouts from the deck above her, barely audible over the thunder of two dozen footsteps. Rey listens to the muffled chatter of the crew and stretches. They’re not due to reach the New World for another two months; the chances of her remaining hidden are low – immeasurably low. All the same, she readjusts herself in her hiding spot, careful to make herself as small as possible.

The captain of this ship is a kind man, or so she’s been told. That doesn’t mean he won’t throw her overboard if he finds her. Rey would prefer to be left on an island closer to the New World than further from it, so her only plan for the moment is to lay low and keep quiet.

As she readjusts herself again, Rey hears the wood of the lower deck ladder creak. She freezes, unable to see past the fish barrel and unwilling to move and try. She catches a whisper of curses and grumbling as the man putters around the crew’s quarters, searching for heaven knows what. It takes him far too long to return above deck, but Rey waits until he does to even _think_ about breathing.

Two months, she reminds herself, once she’s sure he’s back above deck. Two months, and then she’ll be her own woman, no need to hide or anything of the sort. She’ll be free.

She slips in and out of a doze as the days go on, only sneaking out to relieve herself in the bow of the ship. It’s only, one day, when the thunder of footsteps shifts and the shouting grows louder that Rey finds herself lurching back into complete consciousness.

For a moment, there is nothing. Then, the ship rocks. The rats that have snuck aboard slip through the shallow alleys between food barrels, scurrying away from something Rey cannot see.

The air heaves.

A cannon ball goes crashing through the side of the trading ship’s hull.

Rey screams.

Splinters of wood go flying in all directions, digging into the skin of her arms as she rushes to cover her face. Ears ringing, she waits several seconds before daring to open her eyes. Then, she scrambles forward, wasting precious seconds glancing out of the new hole in the ship’s side.

It’s about midday, but the ship across the water seems to be made of shadow. It glides through the water, its cannons sparking as they go to fire again. Rey leaps backwards towards her barrel as the cannonballs tear through the upper deck. When she looks through the hole again, it’s to see a man falling, head first, into the choppy water.

When she looks out towards the enemy ship once more, it’s to find the black of a pirate flag glaring at her from miles above her head.

“Shit.”

The ship is rocked by another round of cannon fire. What few rats remain scurry over Rey’s feet as the hull begins to fill with water. Rey doesn’t bother to remain behind her barrel, even as the ship is rocked again. Like the rats, she decides to run.

Years of navigating Old World streets have made her lithe, and the thinness of her garb makes her quick. She waits through another round of cannon fire, then goes scrambling through one of the ship’s newest wounds. She scales the side of the trade ship with steady hands, despite the ache in her muscles and the shallowness of her breath.

The destruction she sees when she reaches the main deck is staggering. The main mast has toppled over, and the deck is covered with blood and splintered wood. The pirates have tossed grappling hooks across the water and are boarding the ship; Rey can see the glint of their cutlasses, even through the smoke. She weaves her way through the crowd of wounded and broken tradesmen, keeping her head low to better hide her face. If she can make it off the ship, maybe find a place to hide in the pirate’s hold, then she can still make it to the New World alive.

“Captain, look! A girl!”

She’s not sure if it’s one of the tradesmen or one of the pirates who shouts it, but it doesn’t really matter.

“Shit.”

She breaks into a run as both crews swing their attention to her. A slew of outstretched hands grab for her, but she evades them, leaving pirates and tradesmen to tackle each other. She pushes a pirate into the ocean and grabs his grappling hook, testing its strength before pushing herself up onto the trade ship’s upper rail.

“Oh, no you don’t!”

Someone grabs her and hauls her backwards, throwing her onto the deck. Rey looks up and snarls at the pirate whose laid hands on her, but finds herself caught off-guard. The man does not appear to have a face.

“Come here, you!”

Rey whips her head around. The pirates who’ve come aboard have already rounded up what remains of the tradesmen and has them pushed back against one of the still-standing masts, held there by rope and intimidation. The captain is at their front, and the fury on his face makes Rey want to throw herself into the sea.

“This is your fault!” the captain shouts, straining against his bonds. “A stowaway – a _woman_ , no less. No wonder we were taken so easily!”

Sympathetic grumbling moves through the crew. Rey resists the urge to roll her eyes at the old superstition. Women aboard ships of any sort are no more likely to bring about bad luck, she reasons, than a bored or untested crew.

“Now, captain,” a dark voice interrupts. “Don’t try and blame your incompetence on this young woman. I thought a man of your stature would know how to show a lady some respect.”

The air around the whole of the ship seems to go still. Rey hears a new set of boots settle onto the trade ship’s deck; she peers through the crowd, trying to spot the newcomer. She’s shoved out of his way before she can manage a look at his face, her head crashing against the wood of the deck.

A moment later, she’s hauled upright by two of the faceless pirates. Both of her arms are pinned to her sides and blood drips from her temple, but otherwise, she goes unharmed. Head spinning, she squints at the tall, dark man now stalking towards the tradesmen.

“Take her aboard,” he orders without turning around. “Put her in the brig and keep her there. The rest of us will join you shortly.”

Then, he draws his blade. Rey hears him address the captain with a voice like silk and tries to parse what he’s saying, but his men have already turned her about and moved her towards the side of the ship. By the time they’ve made it across the waves, the captain’s voice has died, and the tradesmen have started screaming.

Rey does not look back. She goes peacefully into the brig, her captors’ grips firm but impartial. Though they make no move to harm nor harass her, Rey finds that her knees still shake. When they shove her into one of many cells, she crashes onto the floor. Stomach full of bile, Rey lifts her head and watches her captors lock the door without so much as a glance in her direction. She follows them with her eyes until they’ve disappeared onto the upper deck.

The metal of the cell bars is cool against her head. Rey closes her eyes and tries to hold still, but the shakes have moved from her legs to her chest and the whole of her being.

She doesn’t care what these men do to her. They can kill her, torture her, leave her marooned on a deserted island; so long as they don’t return her to the Old World, she will do whatever they want her to. She has no other choice.

*

Rey sits in the darkness of the pirate hold for what feels like eons. The world around her grows fuzzy, though she doesn’t know whether to blame her nausea or the thick, stale air. The sound of methodical footsteps above her head lulls her into something almost akin to sleep, were it that she could feel rested at all.

It’s only when the shadows begin to shift that she bothers to move. She lifts her head from the cell bars and squints into the darkness, ears pricked for the sound of movement. She glimpses a face, barely visible, then hears a rustle of hair and the creak of old leather as someone shifts outside her cell.

“I can see you,” she snaps – a lie, but only half of one. “Stop hiding.”

The shadows chuckle. “Why would I need to hide from you, little rat?” they ask. “It is you who are in the cell, and I who walk free.”

Rey narrows her eyes and crosses her arms over her chest. They are stick thin and unimpressive, but she glares long and hard enough that the shadows stop moving. They coalesce into the form of a man, tall and pale, with black gloves covering his hands and a black hat on his head.

There is a mask over his eyes, but it does not phase her.

“Who are you?”

“Shouldn’t I be asking you?” The shadow smiles. “What is a scavenger like yourself doing so far from the Old World?”

“Who are you calling a scavenger?” Rey bares her teeth. “You aren’t any better than me.” The world around her shivers. Rey’s breath catches in her throat, and she rests her head against the cell bars once more, eyes closed.

The shadow sinks down to look her in the eye, and Rey thinks she sees him smile. “A vulture knows its fellow vultures, true,” he admits. “But do not make the mistake of assuming we are birds of a feather.”

It hurts to open her eyes to roll them, but Rey manages. “Pretty words,” she jeers. Saliva wells in her throat, and she spits it onto the floor, just before the shadow’s feet. Even in the darkness, she can see specks of blood amongst the phlegm.

The shadow recoils, then tilts his head. “Are you trying to get thrown off my ship?”

Rey freezes. “Isn’t that what you’re going to do to me, anyway?” Her voice does not waver, though she can feel her hands starting to shake. She blinks, and for a moment, black spots dance in front of her eyes.

The shadow is silent.

“Or are you going to share me with your crew, first?” Rey continues. “I’ve heard that pirates like to do that; strange, given how possessive all of you are supposed to be.” She doesn’t know why she’s babbling; the words fall out of her mouth without any rhyme or reason. In the darkness, she sees the shadow frown.

“What’s your name?” he asks, his voice soft.

Rey takes a moment and looks at him, really looks at him. There are lines between his eyebrows that are sharpened by the dark, and his mouth is turned down in a perpetual frown. His hands are gloved and weaved together just in front of his knees as he crouches in front of her cell.

Rey wants nothing more than to grab the man by his over-expensive coat and shake him, dig her nails into the skin of his face just to see if he bleeds.

“My name is Rey,” she says. The world shivers again. The shadow’s mouth moves, but Rey cannot hear what he says. “What’s yours?” she manages, only to realize that she’s no longer eye to eye with him, but staring up at him from the floor.

The door to her cell opens, and the shadow slips inside. Rey offers no resistance as he lifts her up into his arms. As the world shivers again, she feels his chest heave with breath.

“Captain Ren,” she hears him say. “Kylo Ren.”

With that, the darkness consumes her whole.


	2. Arc I, Chapter 02

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there are familiar faces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all of your kind comments! I thrive off of your feedback and can't wait to share the rest of the story with you. *rubs hands together* Arrrr, let's move forward!

****Rey wakes.

Her back aches, and the floorboards beneath her offer her no relief. There is a lantern hanging above her head – a new development. She doesn’t know why the pirates would have offered her any light, but she takes what she can get, staring around her cell and trying to assess what’s happened.

There are no bars. Rey blinks. She’s not in her cell. The board she is lying on is the top of a table, and the lantern lights the desk of a man swathed in white. He looks over his shoulder at her and reveals a face wizened by age. His beard is more yellow than white, and he wears a pair of thin spectacles like the gentlemen of the Old World do.

Rey tries to speak, but her throat is too dry. The croak that escapes her makes the man smile.

“Don’t try to speak, child,” he chides, turning back to his desk. “And lie back down before you make your condition worse.”

Rey croaks again, but does as she is told. The man comes to hover over her, pushing his glasses up on his nose. He lifts the lantern over her head and looks into one eye, then into the other. Gentle fingers poke through Rey’s hair at the back of her head. Rey hisses at the pain, but sees the man nod as though satisfied.

“You hit your head a little harder than the captain anticipated,” he tells her, setting the lantern aside. “However, I think you’ll be alright. The bones of your skull feel unbroken; at the worst, I believe you’ll experience some nausea and dizziness for the next few days. Even the smallest of injuries can be made worse by shock, but time is the best of healers.”

He unclips a flask at his hip and takes a drink, then offers it to Rey. She drinks from it and winces at the dark taste of the rum within.

“Better than the water,” the man says as he takes it away. “Safer, too.”

Rey clears her throat once, then again. “Who are you?” she asks, though her voice still cracks.

The man smiles. “I’m not supposed to have a name,” he tells her. “But I used to be called Ben. Worked as a doctor on a ship headed back towards the Old World.”

Rey grimaces. “You were going back?”

For a moment, the doctor looks sad. “Aye, I was,” he says. “I went to the New World because I thought it would help me get away from a few…difficulties, shall we say. It turns out that I was mistaken.”

Rey searches for feelings of sympathy and manages the smallest of noises. The doctor chuckles, then moves back to his desk.

“The captain has ordered that you remain with me until you’ve healed,” he says. “I have a spare hammock for you that can be set up in the corner. Better to sleep there than on my operating table. We’ll move you later, though. The captain has also welcomed you to use his latrine, though it’s in his quarters, not mine.” The look he shoots her is foreign, but Rey sees a playful warmth dancing through his wrinkles. “There shouldn’t be any more excitement today,” he continues, “so you’re welcome to go back to sleep.”

“He won’t –” Rey’s voice cracks again, and she clears her throat violently. “He won’t put me back in my cell?”

“Oh, maybe once you’re healed.” The doctor shrugs. “But for now, you’ve been charged to me.”

Rey hums. She traces patterns on the cabin’s ceiling, watching the way the wood whorls in on itself. Her head still aches, but the pain has lessened and her eyesight is free from dark spots. The nausea remains, though, and keeps her pinned to the table.

“What ship is this?” she asks, some time later.

She hears Ben shuffle at his desk. “The _Finalizer_ ,” he says. “Fastest ship in Elijah Snoke’s fleet and maintained by his fiercest captain.”

“Never heard of it,” Rey manages. “Never heard of Snoke, either, or of any Kylo Ren.”

Ben laughs. When she glances over, she finds him clutching his side with one hand and keeping his glasses on with the other. “Don’t let the captain hear that,” he says. “He likes to believe that his reputation proceeds him.”

Rey manages a quick smile, then returns her attention to the ceiling. Ben’s laughter is slow to die away; as Rey dozes, she hears him chuckling to himself.

There comes a knock on the door that wakes her from her half-sleep. Rey goes to sit up at once, only to find herself forced back down by one of Ben’s calloused hands. He opens the door and immediately steps aside to let someone in.

Rey looks up and sees Kylo Ren hovering over her. He retains his mask, but she can see his dark eyes glinting behind it.

Rey almost wants to grin at him, but resists the urge.

“She’ll be right as rain in no time, captain,” Ben says from behind him. “She’s already been up and speaking; she’s strong, if anything.”

“Indeed,” Kylo Ren hums. “Doctor, please leave us.”

The urge to grin disappears at once. Rey looks for Ben and sees him hesitate, but he does as his captain orders. The door to the doctor’s quarters closes softly. Kylo Ren backs away from the operating table only to flip the lock. Rey winces as the sound of metal on metal echoes through the room.

Then, Kylo’s face is before her again.

“I’m still deciding what to do with you,” he admits. “If the doctor is correct, once you have healed, you could be of great use to us. The benefits of having a woman on board are numerous, both for espionage and for morale.”

Rey manages a laugh. “So you do intend to share me,” she says. “Will you wait until I’ve healed to pass me around, or would you like to begin immediately?”

To her surprise, Kylo Ren scowls. “I’m not going to pass you through my crew,” he says through gritted teeth. “They have no need for earthly pleasures, and if they do, they can attend to those needs elsewhere.”

Rey tries to raise an eyebrow and fails.

“I could, however, leave you,” Kylo says. “It’ll save me the time of reworking rations, and the time it’ll take you to grow accustom to the sea. Not only that, but you’re stealing the attention of my doctor.”

Rey knows this game. She bites her lip and tastes salt, then the iron of blood. “You heard him earlier,” she says. “I’ll be fine in a day or two. I can work hard, and I’m familiar with the way a ship works. I don’t eat much, either; you’d hardly even notice me.”

If a hint of desperation leaks into her voice, she prays the captain doesn’t hear it. The chance to make it to the New World is just beyond her grasp; if she plays her cards right –

“Oh, I doubt that,” Kylo mutters. “No, no. I’ll put you on the next ship back to the Old World and save myself time. I have no need for additional crew.” He turns away and runs a hand through his mane of black hair as he walks towards the door.

“No!” It hurts her throat, the sound, but it makes him fall short. Rey lifts herself off of the table and props herself up on her elbow as the captain turns around. She knows she must look a mess, her hair falling into her face, her body too skinny, battered, and bruised, but she must try.

Kylo is, for a moment, silent. “Would you prefer I kill you?” he asks, softly.

“Yes.” It leaves her mouth like a prayer.

“Would you prefer I give you to my crew?”

“Yes.”

Something in Kylo’s face grows hard. “Would you prefer I maroon you?”

“Yes,” Rey says with a nod. She’s breathless, either from the throbbing of her head or from the intensity of the captain’s gaze. She doesn’t know which.

The captain is silent. He takes a hesitant step towards the operating table, then seems to stop himself. His hands cross behind his back and he stands, tall and strong.

“If there anything you would not do to be free of that place?” he asks.

Rey looks at him, holds his gaze, and shakes her head.

The doctor’s quarters are heavy with quiet. Finally, though, finally, Kylo breaks it. He chuckles, then casts his gaze down to his boots. “You will remain with the doctor through the night,” he says. “I expect you on deck tomorrow, though. If you do know your way around a ship, as you so claim, you may remain as part of my crew. If you’re lying, though, I _will_ send you back to the Old World. Do you understand?”

The breath held in Rey’s lungs leaves her all at once. “I understand,” she says with a nod. “Thank you so much.”

“ _Captain_ ,” Kylo emphasizes. “I am your captain, and you will address me as such. That, or ‘sir’.”

“Yes, sir,” Rey says, nodding again. “Thank you, sir. I understand, sir.”

There is amusement twinkling in the captain’s eyes, or so she believes. He leaves her without another word, ushering Ben in as he goes to return to – whatever it is that he’s doing. The doctor watches him as he goes, then returns his attention to Rey.

“I’m staying on the ship,” she informs him as she lies back down.

Ben chuckles. “I’m hardly surprised,” he tells her. “You look like a woman who can get her own way, even when faced with a captain like him.”

For the first time in several days, Rey laughs. “I hope so,” she says, more to herself than to the doctor. “I do hope so.”

*

The next morning finds her standing alert on the main deck. Her clothes remain tattered, and the shoes that she once wore are no more than thin strips of fabric, but Rey thinks herself prepared. The men of the crew glance at her, idly, though there is no malice in their gaze. Rey studies their faces and finds nothing in them, nothing at all; no distinctive details, no twinkling eyes, nothing. They are a faceless mass, and she, it seems, must join them.

She sees Kylo Ren emerged from what she assumes is the captain’s cabin and wonders: does he wear a mask because he has no face, or perhaps _because_ he has one?

“Good morning, sir,” she says, offering him a salute.

He wrinkles his nose at her, though whether in disgust or amusement, she cannot tell. “Why aren’t you working, little rat?” he asks.

Rey does not wince at the name; she has been called far worse in the past. “I looked for the quartermaster, sir, but was unable to find him. I thought I could get my orders from you, sir.”

She thinks he looks thoughtful, for a moment, but it’s a look that’s quick to pass. “There are few distinctions amongst my crew,” he admits. “I am the captain; they answer to me, and they do not question me.”

Goosebumps prickle over Rey’s skin, despite the balmy ocean air. She bites her lip in order to keep herself from asking why—or even how—and waits, instead, for Kylo to provide her with orders.

He takes her on a tour around the ship.

It’s not a large vessel, the _Finalizer_ , but it’s larger than any Rey’s been on in the past. Its three masts hold numerous sails, and Rey finds herself scurrying up to play amongst them. Her hands work quickly as she coaxes the sheets to unfurl. Kylo sends her higher, after watching her success, and assigns her to the crow’s nest. She sits and watches the roll of the sea as it stretches on for miles. The crewman who seems to normally be assigned to the position makes no remark about her presence alongside him, but she sees him glance at her from the corner of his eye more than once.

“What are we looking for?” she asks, after the third or fourth time. The silence, both below and beside her, is disturbing; she hardly expects an answer.

“Mos Eisley.”

Rey blinks, surprised. “What’s Mos Eisley?”

She thinks she sees the hints of a smile flicker across the crewman’s featureless face. “It’s a place,” he grunts, reaching for his spyglass.

Rey waits, but he does not continue.

When her shift in the crow’s nest ends, she scurries down, moving to throw the ropes slowly but with ease. Her feet are, for a moment, unsteady on the deck, but she’s able to brace herself on the siding as she makes her way back to the doctor’s cabin. She’s quickly sent out again (Ben is tending to a man injured in battle, and while Rey’s stomach is strong, there are things in this world she doesn’t want to see) and goes to attend to the galley, where the ship’s cook has dinner brewing. Some of the crewmen join her and sit in relative silence, occasionally muttering to one another as they wait for their food.

It’s a thin meal – salted fish, dry biscuits, and rum rations – but Rey eats heartily. Only the captain’s footsteps on the stairs below deck stop her from licking her steel plate clean, and even then, it’s an effort. Rey alternates her stare between her plate and the captain, her hands twitching where she keeps them tucked in her lap.

Kylo catches her staring, once, and quirks an eyebrow in her direction. Rey only shrugs. Her eyes widen when he jerks his head, then goes to make his way back up to the main deck. She waits as long as she feels is necessary, then leaves her plate in the galley and goes to join him.

The sun is setting on the distant horizon, painting the ocean pink, purple, and green. The captain does not linger to stare at it, and instead nods towards his cabin. Rey follows without a word.

Kylo’s cabin is not really a cabin and more of a place that is _trying_ to be a cabin. There is a hammock in one corner, the same make as the crew’s, and a desk just barely larger than the table Ben operates on. There are half a dozen maps spread over the top of it, layered atop one another alongside a legion of tools. Rey watches, her hands tucked behind her back, as Kylo takes a seat behind it. He wipes traces of salt away from his lips, then pins her with his gaze.

For a moment, there is silence.

“You’ve passed muster,” he says, at last. “Your duties will vary, depending on where extra attention is needed during the day, but it seems I will not be sending you back to the Old World.”

Rey’s shoulders sag with relief. “Thank you, sir,” she says, ducking her head.

She hears Kylo snort and risks a glance upward. His nose is wrinkled once more, though his expression remains uninterpretable. Rey finds herself curious and forces herself to look away.

“We’re making haste for Mos Eisley,” Kylo tells her. “Should I expect you to jump ship there, or will you remain a part of my crew?”

Rey furrows her brow. “I didn’t realize I had a choice.”

Kylo snorts again. “I could stop you from running away, if I liked,” he says, bringing his boots up to rest on his desk. “I’ve sent word to my master informing him of your acquisition. It’s likely he’ll want to meet you. I’d hate to have to write to him and tell him you’ve run away.”

“What, are runaways uncommon on your ship?” Rey asks. She finds herself looking up and tacks a hasty “sir” onto her statement. Kylo, to her relief, doesn’t chide her.

“Not only are they uncommon,” he says. “They’re unheard of. The crew of the _Finalizer_ is the loyalest you’ll find.”

Rey thinks to the mass of men still eating below decks and, once again, tries to distinguish one of them from the rest. She finds it impossible, and so does not comment.

“I want to see the New World, sir,” she says, instead. “I could do that just as well with you as I could on my own.”

“Better, with me,” Kylo agrees. His confidence makes her want to laugh, but Rey restrains herself. She nods, but lets the subject drop.

“What is Mos Eisley, anyway, sir?”

“Rephrase that,” Kylo says, taking his feet from the desk. He motions her forward and picks up one of his tools in a still-gloved hand. “‘ _Where’s_ Mos Eisley’ is what you should be asking.”

Rey huffs and crosses her arms over her chest. “ _Where_ is Mos Eisley, then? And why are we going there?”

“Because we need to sell off some of the goods your kind captain was generous enough to give us,” Kylo says. He motions her forward again, then uses his tool to point to an inconsequential speck on one of his many maps. “Mos Eisley is here. It’s a pirate haven; a good place to sell one’s wares when they aren’t exactly trading company approved.”

Rey tries not to wrinkle her nose, but Kylo’s chuckle informs her that she’s failed.

“You’re a pirate, now, Rey,” he says with a cruel grin. “Can’t be looking down on the folks who are like you.”

He sends her from his cabin, after that, without so much as a comment about her dropped “sir”s. Ben is waiting for her in the doctor’s cabin and greets her with a smile. His fingernails, she notices, have dried blood underneath them, but his hands are otherwise clean.

They don’t talk much. Rey drops into her hammock as the sun finishes setting and is lulled to sleep by the gentle rocking of the waves. She wakes only once to see Ben blowing out the lantern, but otherwise, it’s the most peaceful sleep she’s had in years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you thought! XOXO


	3. Arc I, Chapter 03

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is practice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again! Thank you to everyone who leaves kind reviews; my heart flutters every time I see one pop up in my inbox. I hope you enjoy this next chapter! XOXO

The days blur into one another. Rey becomes intimately familiar with the _Finalizer_ ’s rigging and makes a game of swinging through it. Her races against herself seem to amuse the crew, though Ben watches with mild concern and Kylo with – something; an emotion she can’t quite name. He doesn’t tell her to stop, though, so she assumes it’s not disapproval.

It’s midday, some two weeks into their journey, when he calls her down to the deck. Rey lands lightly a few feet in front of him. She’s abandoned her Old World clothes in favor of the smallest crew member’s most worn pair of breeches. The shirt she wears is long and loose, bleached white by the salt and ocean sun. Ben was the one to give them to her, but it is Kylo, Rey knows, who collected them. The pants cannot be his, but he won’t tell her who the shirt’s from.

Kylo waits, impatient, on the main deck, free of his hat, coat, and gloves. Rey blinks, surprised, only to notice a moment later that he is armed. She carries a dagger in one of her boots, but if he were to attack (and she wonders, sometimes, if he would), it would be impossible for her to defend herself. She has yet to claim a proper sword.

“Took you long enough,” the captain barks. He passes his sword from one hand to the other and motions the growing crowd of crewmen away. “A lesson is in order, today.”

“A lesson, sir?” Unklar Plutt had once said something similar, and the memory of it – guilt and a knife in the back alley of the Old World – leaves Rey wary. It’s only years spent watching the shadows of Old World streets and a little bit of luck that allows her to catch the streak of silver that cuts through the air.

The hilt of the sword Kylo once held is still warm. Rey scowls as she readjusts the grip of it in her hand.

“You could have run me through!”

“Hardly,” Kylo scoffs. “If I wanted to hurt you, Rey, I would.” He takes a step forward and begins to circle her, careful to remain just outside the reach of her blade.

“Adjust your stance,” he instructs. “Move your right foot forward and your left foot back. Bend your knees.”

Rey mutters a curse under her breath, but does as the captain instructs. She watches as Kylo procures another sword from his faceless crew, then stills as he points it at her. The tip of the blade taps her right calf, moving her forward.

“Not bad,” Kylo says, still circling. Rey feels her temper start to fray as he pokes her again, the corners of his mouth twitching with delight.

“What is this all about?” she snaps, somewhere in the middle of his third circle. “Do you think that I’m going to have time to get into a stance when we’re boarding another ship?”

“I expect that it will become a habit for you,” Kylo replies. “The longer you practice it, the more natural it will become. Now, raise your sword.”

He adjusts her grip, too, lifting her wrist to the proper angle. His ungloved hands are warm and smooth against her skin – not a sailor’s hands, Rey thinks. A moment later, the captain steps away. He mirrors her, a few feet away, his sword lifted with practiced ease.

“Do as I do,” he says. He brings his sword down in an arch across his body. “One.”

Rey tries to watch his feet and hands all at once and falls into something that she _thinks_ is the proper form. Kylo, when she looks at him, is unimpressed.

“Two.”

He moves again, and Rey follows.

“Three. Four.”

He steps closer, and Rey does the same. The _fullers_ of their swords drag against one another, but Kylo does not send her backward, nor does he pull away.

“Five.”

Another step; trickier, foot-wise. Rey stumbles and steadies herself on Kylo’s nearby arm. “Can you show me that again?” she asks, without meeting his eye. When she does glance up, it’s to find him staring at her.

Rey lets go of his arm like it’s burned her. Kylo clears his throat and steps aside.

“Yeah. Let’s – let’s run that again.”

They drill until Rey’s arms are shaking, and even longer after that. Only a shout from the man in the crow’s nest brings an end to their practice. Rey’s sword doesn’t quite clatter onto the deck when Kylo looks away, but it’s a near thing. She slumps against the nearby mast as the man from the crow’s nest descends.

“What’s the matter?” Rey doesn’t have to look up to know that Kylo is frowning.

“Nothing wrong, captain,” her crew mate says. “But there’s a sloop coming up on the horizon flying the Supreme Leader’s colors. Do you think –?”

Rey looks up and sees Kylo’s face go blank. He sheathes his sword at once and, for moment, fixes his gaze on the horizon. “A sloop?” he asks, his voice pitched high. The man from the crow’s nest nods, and his shoulders seem to drop. “The Supreme Leader wouldn’t lower himself to sail in a sloop,” he says. Rey hears disgust settling into his voice and tries not to shrink. “But it’s likely one of his messengers. Prepare to receive a boarding party.”

The crew scurries off. Rey pushes herself off of the mast and goes to follow, only to be stopped by the weight of Kylo’s hand on her shoulder.

“Go and assist the cook,” he tells her, without looking her in the face. “Stay in the kitchens unless I call for you.”

Rey furrows her brow. “I thought you said you told them about me?”

“I have,” Kylo says darkly. “Which is why I may have to call for you. But your captain has given you an order, and it’s your job to obey it.”

There is warning there, and Rey does not have to be told to take it. She retreats as quickly as she can, disappearing below deck to find the cook wailing over what remains of the ship’s rations.

“There’s not going to be enough rum for this,” he tells her, scowling at the few barrels they have remaining. Rey frowns, too, and bites her bottom lip.

“How long will it be before we reach Mos Eisley?”

The cook snorts. “Who knows? The captain does as the captain pleases. Now, come on. I need you to peel some potatoes.”

*

It’s just past nightfall when the sloop finally drops anchor next to the _Finalizer_. Rey, up to her knees in potato peels, keeps her head low as she and the cook deliver rations first to the crew, then to the captain’s cabin. There are no unfamiliar faces in the dinner crowd – but then again, Rey reasons, it’s not like she would know.

The cook knocks on the door to the captain’s cabin, then toes it open. The light is dim, but Rey can see a figure standing in front of Kylo Ren’s map-covered table. The captain is, himself, settled in his chair.

“Your dinner, sir,” the cook says, bowing his head. Rey tries to make herself small as Kylo stares at them, only to feel the weight of another gaze settle on her shoulders.

“Bring it here,” Kylo says, motioning them both forward with a sharp flick of the hand. “Then get out of my sight.”

He sounds like the man who eviscerated the trade ship’s captain. Rey does not look at him as she sets his portions on the desk, choosing instead to study the new callouses that have started appearing on her fingers.

A pale finger, attached to an equally pale hand and a thin, delicate wrist, reaches out and taps one of Rey’s knuckles. She inhales and glances up to find one of the captain’s companions staring at her, a smirk on his hairless face.

“So,” the man says, his accent making the word slippery. “This is the newest member of your crew, is it, Ren?”

Rey risks a glance over at her captain and sees him frown. “She is.”

“How strange that she retains…” the man waves the hand not hovering over Rey’s in her general direction. “…all of this, though I suppose there isn’t much to speak of.”

The flare of pride that rages in Rey’s chest is squashed as Kylo Ren laughs. “Give it time,” he says. “It’s only been a few weeks. Once our run to Mos Eisley is complete, I’m sure she’ll start to blend in.”

The man hums, but says nothing. As he turns away, the cabin’s low light catches in his swath of ginger hair. Rey takes the opportunity to hurry away, following the cook out onto the deck without so much as a glance backwards.

The cook, she notices, has gone silent and pale. He dismisses her with a wave, then slips below deck, all without a sound. Rey doesn’t hesitate to run for the doctor’s cabin; her hands are shaking, though she can’t name the reason why.

Ben is sitting in his hammock, a book in hand, when she throws the door open, though he rises when he sees her. Rey closes the door behind her and hurls herself towards the operating table. She settles on it and cradles her arms against her chest, all the while willing her twitching fingers to still.

“What’s happened?” Ben asks. “What’s going on?”

“It’s nothing,” Rey says through gritted teeth. “I just – didn’t – it’s nothing.”

Ben narrows his eyes. He takes a hesitant step forward, then presses the back of his hand against Rey’s forehead. Rey closes her eyes at the touch and allows herself to take in a long, slow breath. A moment later, Ben takes his hand away.

“You met the General, I suppose,” he says with a sigh.

Rey nods. “I don’t think I was supposed to,” she says. “But the cook wanted help delivering dinner to the captain, and I couldn’t say no. He’s – something about him is wrong.”

“There are a lot of things about him that are wrong,” Ben mutters. He glances at the cabin door, then rests a hand on Rey’s arm. “It’s a complicated business, all of this: men forgetting where they’ve come from, forgetting their families, forgetting their names. I keep a journal, myself, and there are still days when I don’t remember who I am. That man, and the Supreme Leader – Snoke – there’s something not natural about the two of them. Something not natural about the captain, either. But you can’t go mentioning it.” He brings his other hand up and gently squeezes Rey’s shoulders. “Best to pretend you don’t notice. It’ll keep you out of trouble.”

Rey hesitates, then nods. Ben looks her in the eye as though he’s searching for something. Then, he lets his hands fall to his sides. “Get some rest,” he tells her, moving back to his own hammock. “By my bet, the General will be gone come morning, and everything will go back to normal.”

“Whatever that means,” Rey murmurs. Ben does not reply, but she thinks she sees his shoulders droop. He blows out the lantern light, then clambers into his hammock, and the doctor’s quarters fall silent.

Rey sits on the operating table a moment longer, then hops down and makes her way into the corner. She slips into her own hammock and makes a game as her eyes adjust to the dark, tracing patterns on the woodwork of the ceiling. Outside, she hears a gust of wind dance through the sails, and the _Finalizer_ creaks.

Sleep does not come easy, but when it does, it threatens to swallow her whole.

*

Ben’s theory proves correct, for when Rey makes her way onto the deck in the morning, the sloop and the red-headed general are gone. Kylo Ren, she notices, is standing at the helm, his gloves and his mask once again obscuring the majority of his person. The crew seems quieter than ever before, but Rey does as the doctor instructs and tries to pay it no mind. She makes her way up to the sterncastle deck and stands quietly at Kylo’s side, waiting for her morning instructions.

Kylo, though, is silent as well. The only noise that comes from him is the creak of the leather he wears. Rey finds herself becoming attuned to it as she stands, waiting. By the time the captain does speak, she has to shake herself in order to hear his voice over the noise.

“We’re still several days out from Mos Eisley,” he tells her. “But there’s a ship we should be coming across that we’ll have to take.”

“Why is that, sir?”

The formality in her voice makes the corner of the captain’s mouth twitch, but he does not comment on it. “The Supreme Leader is seeking a prize of particular interest,” he says. “And he’s instructed me to retrieve it.”

“A prize, sir?”

Kylo glances at her, sidelong. “Aye, a prize. One that’s as important to me as it is to him.”

Rey waits for him to say more, but her captain once again falls silent. She rocks back on her heels and starts playing in the rigging, in her mind; finding routes up, up, up, until she finds herself staring at the far away crow’s nest.

“Who was the man in your cabin last night, sir?”

Kylo huffs and adjusts his stance behind the wheel. “That was General Hux, one of the commanders of the Supreme Leader’s fleet.”

Rey furrows her brow. “So he’s not a captain like you?”

Again she sees a twitch of Kylo’s lips that threatens to become a smile. “No. Hux is a strategist, made more for the forts than for journeys at sea. His time is most often spent serving the Supreme Leader directly.”

Rey remembers the harsh paleness of his skin and wrinkles her nose, but she says nothing. Silence reigns over the sterncastle deck. At last, once the sun has settled itself well in the middle of the sky, Kylo Ren sighs.

“Take to the crow’s nest, Rey,” he says. “I know it’s what you like to do best.”

Relieved, Rey begins to make her way off of the sterncastle deck. She reaches the stairway, rests her hand on the handrail, but then looks back.

“Will we continue our lessons today, captain?”

She still does not carry a sword at her side, but she finds she misses the weight of it in her hand. The captain does not attempt to hide his smile.

“If I’m in the mood,” he tells her, which Rey takes to mean ‘yes’. “Now get out of my sight.”

It’s friendlier than the order from the night before. Rey makes her way over to the main mast and scales upward through the rigging, not bothering to hide her smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think!


	4. Arc I, Chapter 04

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which it rains.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The summaries always seem so anticlimactic, but I do like to keep them simple. Thank you for all of the views and kind comments! I hope you enjoy the next installment! XOXO

Rey alternates her time, in the days afterward, between the galley and the rigging. If the day runs slow and hot, and the world seems at ease, Kylo will call her from whichever post she holds and press a sword into her hands. They run drills, practicing forms until her arms ache and her legs are sore. Ben teaches her stretches in the privacy of the doctor’s quarters to combat the pain, but Rey relishes in it and feels herself beginning to grow stronger.

She watches her captain with a predator’s eye, now, following the way the ocean hair pushes his hair out of his face. Her own hair gets stuck in her mouth; she spits it out without looking away as the two of them circle one another, waiting. Most of her attention is on her footwork, but she sees the telltale jolt of Kylo Ren’s head that tells her he’s going to lung. She ducks out of the way just in time, but he’s quick to recover. Their blades meet as she parries his blow, scurrying about the deck as she plays to the defensive.

“You can’t run from me forever, you know,” Kylo huffs at her when their blades meet again. “A pirate is offensive, Rey. What good will you be if you can’t attack someone who’s attacking you?”

Rey spits in his face.

Kylo stumbles backward, cursing, but does not move quickly enough. Rey dances forward, poking him in the chest. When he raises his sword to come at her again, she’s behind him, tapping him in the middle of the back. A quick move between his legs as he goes to turn, and he’s on his back, staring up to see her sword pointed at his face.

For a moment, the deck is silent.

Then, Ben – from the door of his cabin or from somewhere on deck, Rey isn’t sure – cheers.

Rey laughs and takes her foot from Kylo Ren’s chest and grins as the crew murmurs their approval. Only after she’s spotted Ben pocketing what seems to be a bag full of coins does she return her attention to her captain.

There’s still a bit of her spit lingering on his nose, but he hasn’t moved to wipe it away.

“You okay, sir?” Rey tilts her head, her smile beginning to fade.

This, it seems, makes Kylo come to himself. He brushes her offered hand away and stands, taller, somehow, than he had been before. “Well done,” he admits, though he refuses to look at her. “If you can do it again tomorrow, I’ll actually be impressed.”

With that, he walks away, shouting for the still-watching crew to scatter. Rey follows him with her eyes until he disappears into his cabin and has to fight the urge to smirk.

It takes time, after that, for him to reveal any information to her, be it about Mos Eisley or the ship they’ve supposedly been sent after. One day, however, with the noon sun beating down on both of their necks – Rey lounging on the mizzenmast’s yardarm and Kylo back at the helm – he breaks and starts talking.

“It’s called the _Togruta_ ,” he says, without her prompting. It takes Rey a moment to realize what he’s talking about. “Triple sail, twenty six guns, Royal Navy, by all accounts. It won’t be an easy prize to take, but it’s supposed to be departing Mos Eisley just before we arrive. If we catch her by surprise, we can take her and then go about selling our wares like nobody’s business.”

“Sounds like a plan, sir,” Rey says. She bites her lip, then casts her gaze out across the pale blue sea. “But what if we lose our wares along the way?”

She feels Kylo staring at her, but doesn’t look down to meet his gaze. “The things you took from the trade ship,” she continues. “What’ll we do if they sink?”

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Kylo scowl. “We won’t lose the ship,” he snaps, his hands tightening on the wheel. “Believe me when I say it, Rey: we will not lose. We can’t lose.”

Rey feels doubt settle on her tongue, but she chooses not to reply.

She is in the crow’s nest when clouds begin to form on the horizon. She frowns and fishes out the spyglass one of the crew has lent in her, pressing the cool metal against the skin around her eye. The clouds look harmless enough, but days spent at sea and in the Old World alike have taught her well. Rey scurries down from the crow’s nest and settles in the rigging next to the captain, who remains a statue at the _Finalizer_ ’s helm.

“Storm coming in, captain,” she says. “It’ll likely hit us just before sunset today.”

“Fantastic,” Kylo mutters. “Call it out, Rey, then go help the cook prepare for an early dinner. We’ll want to be ready for whatever happens tonight.”

Rey nods, then does as she’s told. The mood amongst the crew grows tense as she passes along the message, though she doesn’t stay with any one person long enough to hear their opinions on the matter. The cook, however, has no qualms about venting in her general direction.

“Of course this would happen,” he grumbles, tossing what Rey thinks is the last of the salted cod into a pot of warm water. “Two days out from Mos Eisley, and we’re getting a storm. We’re just as likely to be run up on a reef as we are to sink, and gods know what else could go wrong.”

“Should we be worried?” Rey asks, over a barrel of lemons. They make her nose itch, but she endures; Ben has told her to rub the peels against her teeth in order to prevent scurvy, and she’d trade a little discomfort for her health, any day.

“Aye, we should be worried,” the cook snaps. “Always worry, girl. You’re on a pirate ship. Something’s always bound to go wrong, no matter how tame everything seems.”

He goes back to cursing over his pot and leaves Rey with her lemons. She weighs each of them in her hands and listens as the crew’s footsteps thunder against the wood above her head.

When she goes above deck to summon them all for dinner, the clouds on the horizon have grown darker. Kylo Ren, instead of retreating to his cabin, stays to eat with the rest of his crew. When Rey has scraped the last of the cook’s salted cod soup from its bowl, he stands up from his seat and slams his rum tankard on the long, wooden table.

The crew, already quieter than usual, falls still and silent.

“The storm will be a difficult one,” Kylo says. The fingers not wrapped around his tankard tap out a rhythm against the dinner table. “My instruments are not precise, but their message is clear: it will take concentrated effort for the lot of us to stay afloat tonight.”

“If you fail me,” he continues, glaring at each and every member of his crew. His gaze falters when it lands on Rey. “If you fail me,” he says again. “I’ll make sure that whatever blasted gods live in this ocean come for you as we all sink to the bottom. We either make it into Mos Eisley bay alive and afloat, or none of us will make it there at all.”

It’s far from an inspirational message, but it seems to do its job. Kylo Ren sits back down in his seat and seems to fix his gaze on his tankard while the crew around him murmurs their ascent. Rey brushes a strand of hair out of her face and watches as he seems to disappear into the shadows without actually moving at all.

“Come on, girl,” the cook says, somewhere behind her. “No point in letting the grime get hard, even if we’re all going to drown.”

She’s halfway through scrubbing the pot when the first roll of thunder sounds. Rey stills and casts her gaze up to the ceiling, as though she’ll be able to see through the wooden boards and up into the darkened sky.

There is a cough from the galley door. When Rey looks, she finds Kylo Ren hovering in the threshold.

“I need to speak to you,” he says, speaking to Rey but glaring at the cook. The cook makes a sound of annoyance, but takes the pot from her hands, letting Rey scurry off as the captain turns away.

They move to the main deck in silence. Most of the crew has assumed their stations around the deck and are now watching the sky. Rey winces as some of the first drops of cool rain sprinkle themselves on her shoulders.

Kylo leads her to the helm and positions her at his side.

“You’re going to be my eyes,” he says as he takes the ship’s wheel in hand. “Whatever you hear shouted down from the crow’s nest, or whatever you can see, you relay back to me. Understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

He looks as though he wants to say more, but his voice is stopped by another roll of thunder. Rey steps forward and wraps her hand around the deck’s railing, casting her eyes out across the greying sea.

It starts with the bucking of the _Finalizer_ beneath her feet as the ocean waves grow larger. Rey’s hair is pushed back from her face by a chilled wind, and the rain grows steadier, soaking her skin. Rumbles of thunder pile on one another until she can’t tell where one begins and another ends, the world a mess of noise that is punctuated only by bolts of light.

They’re in the midst of the storm before she’s even realized it. The _Finalizer_ heaves, her bow breaking through a wave that runs over the course of the deck, sending the faceless crew sliding as they run to adjust the mast lines.

Somewhere across the deck, a line snaps. Rey hears a shout and sees one of the men go flying.

“We’ve lost the foremast, sir!” she shouts, only to have her voice stolen by the wind. Kylo, however, has seen, and as another bolt of lightning flashes Rey sees him scowl. He adjusts his grip on the wheel, abandoning his gloves and letting them die on the deck. Rey hears the ship shudder.

It becomes mindless. As the world around them drowns, Rey finds herself shouting words that are not words just to make herself heard over the noise. Waves break over the side of the ship like the grey hands of the gods, tearing crew and structure down into the depths. The captain, Rey thinks, in a moment of lucidity, is turned to stone. His dark hair is plastered against his head and his eyes are thinned to slits. He shouts something at her – a threat, or a warning – but Rey does not hear him.

She does hear the wave. It rushes over the sterncastle deck and knocks her off her feet, sending her down against the wooden boards. As the water drains back into the ocean, it drags her with it until she catches herself on the ship’s steady railing. There is salt in her mouth, and she’s choking, but she manages to drag herself back upward.

The captain has not moved, but his jaw is drawn tight and he looks like a monster. Rey fixes her gaze on him as she struggles back to her post and uses him as an anchor, focusing as another wave threatens to drag her under.

Kylo Ren’s eyes go wide as she hits the deck again.

Between the water and the wind, it should be impossible to hear, but two voices reach her ears at the same time. The first cries out her name, strained and desperate. The second is softer, and comes from above.

“Sail ho, captain!”

Rey, as she scrambles onto her feet, looks upward in surprise. Through the rain she can see the man in the crow’s nest waving, his arms like palm leaves blown agust by the storm. “Sail ho!” he shouts again.

Rey fights to remain standing as another wave overtakes the ship. She reaches out towards her captain and feels the chill of his hand as he grabs her arm. He hauls her to his side and keeps her there, his skin never leaving hers.

“They’ve spotted a sail, captain!” Rey shouts, as best she can.

Kylo seems to laugh, but Rey cannot tell. She looks up to the crow’s nest, instead, and waves back at the man. He shouts something else, or so she thinks, but his voice does not reach her.

“I need to go up there,” she says, turning back to Kylo Ren. Any amusement in the man’s face dies at once. He shakes his head and tightens the grip that’s settled around her shoulders.

Rey resists the urge to roll her eyes. As the ship heaves again, she slips from his grip, taking advantage of the rush of water to slide over towards the ship’s side. She hears Kylo shout her name, but she ignores him. The rigging welcomes her like an old friend, its wetness gentle on her grip as she makes her way up, up, until the men on the deck are ants and the storm is her only companion.

The wind, she realizes, is fiercer the higher up she goes. She moves slowly, following the shifts of the ship and clinging to the ropes for dear life. The man in the crow’s nest gives a cry when he sees her, but he does not motion her away. He grabs her arm when she comes his way and drags her into the crow’s nest. Rey gasps and fights to keep the air in her lungs, wincing against the bite of the storm.

“What’s the ship?” she shouts.

The crewman doesn’t say a word, but instead shoves his spyglass into her hands. He points her in the right direction as she comes to her feet, hovering by her shoulder until he’s sure she can see.

It’s a large ship, the one that’s floundering in the waves, cow-like but well equipped. It’s lost its secondary sail and is close enough that Rey can see the crew scrambling, though their colors are unrecognizable.

“Who is it?” she asks, taking the spyglass from her eye. She frowns as the crewman laughs.

“That’s the Royal Navy, girl,” he says, taking his spyglass in hand. “I couldn’t see much of the name, but it looks like the _Togruta_.”

It takes a moment for the information to sink in. Then, Rey groans. She pushes her wet, tangled hair out of her face and goes to descend, grumbling all the way. The wind tugs at her clothes and chills her skin, and she curses at it, all the while watching the chaos below.

The ropes, this time, are not so kind. As the ship tilts, her foot misses its loop, and in a moment, Rey loses her foothold on the rigging. Only the strength of her arms keeps her clinging to the ship, and even then, she can feel the water in the fibers pushing her grip to break. She screams, loud like crystal, and does her best to make herself small.

There is a sharp shout, somewhere below her. The ship shifts, and one of the yardarms comes swinging towards her. As it raps her in the back, Rey is pushed back towards the bulk of the ship. Her grip loosens, then goes free.

For a moment, she is falling.

It is luck that one of her flailing hands catches on the rigging. Rey feels something pop and screams all the louder, but she dangles from the rigging like a fish on a line, secure, no longer falling. The rain and ocean water on her face mix with new tears as she presses herself against the rigging, gently disentangling her hand from the rest of the rope.

From there, it is only a few meters to the captain’s side. A wave washes over the side of the ship as Rey drops down, but it pushes her forward. Once again, Kylo’s strong arm wraps around her, catching her as she crashes into him.

He’s shouting something, likely curses, but Rey’s ears are ringing and she cannot hear him.

“Captain,” she says, seeing his mouth still moving. “Captain! I have information about the ship.”

Though she still cannot hear, she sees Kylo’s mouth snap closed.

“It’s a Royal Navy ship, sir,” she says, all while attempting to right herself. The grip of Kylo’s arm is relentless, even as she tries for comfort, and he does not let her go. “We think it’s the _Togruta_.”

Her wrist is throbbing, but Kylo’s furious expression is enough for her to pay it no mind. He maintains his grip on her, but he shifts, turning out to face what remains of his crew. Rey sees him assessing them with his eyes and fights back a wave of dread that rises in her stomach.

Then, his mouth is at her ear, and the world goes still. “Shout what I shout,” he commands her, if commands can be soft in a storm. “Do not move from my side.”

Unable to reply, Rey simply nods her head.

His orders come hard and fast, after that, through the voice of the man who once had her dragged from a burning ship. What remains of the _Finalizer’_ s crew scrambles to unleash the sails, while some run below decks to save what gunpowder has not yet been touched by the rain. Rey’s voice is raw and her knees are shaking, but the men respond beautifully.

The _Togruta_ dances in and out of sight as Kylo guides the _Finalizer_ towards it. A light goes up on that far away deck, and for a moment, Rey believes it to be fire. It turns out to be a man waving a lantern in their direction.

“What’s he doing?” Rey shouts, looking to her captain.

Kylo Ren smirks. “He thinks we’re coming to help.”

Thunder claps in the sky overhead and rumbles the deck beneath Rey’s feet. She cradles her wrist to her chest and watches as more men disappear below deck. The _Finalizer_ is a twenty gun ship; the _Togruta_ is rumored to have twenty six. If they move quickly, she believes the disadvantage won’t matter.

Kylo keeps the _Finalizer_ coming at their target headlong as to hide their telling name. It’s not until the wind tautens their sails that he turns hard to port, shouting for his men to open the cannon hatches. Rey repeats the order and feels something electric pulse through her veins.

The man who had been waving the lantern seems to go still across the water. The dot of fire falls into the sea just as Kylo shouts, “Fire!”

The sky lights with red and yellow blasts of fire. The siding of the _Togruta_ shatters under the force of the _Finalizer’_ s guns. Even the thunder cannot cover the sound of naval men screaming.

Rey feels Kylo tense as he waits for his men to reload. As soon as a head appears above deck, he is shouting again, and Rey is shouting with him.

The wind catches in their sails. As the second round of cannon fire smashes into the naval ship, the _Finalizer_ leaps forward to circle in front of its bow. Kylo curses and, for a moment, lets Rey go. She reaches out and grips the railing, holding on as the ship whips around.

One of the naval ship’s swivel cannons catches them on the quarter deck, but otherwise, their volley of fire misses. Rey hears Kylo let out a satisfied “ha!” and cannot help but smile, herself.

Lightning cracks above her head. For a moment, the world is filled with white.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think!


	5. Arc I, Chapter 05

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is a discovery.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all! Thanks so much for your kind reviews; it really does make my day to read them. Just to prep you for some things to come: this fic is divided into four 'arcs', as referenced by the chapter titles. I wanted to point that out now in case some of you hadn't noticed so that future updates will continue to make sense.
> 
> Otherwise, happy reading!

In the end, the  _Togruta_ gives up their fight quickly. The faceless crew boards the naval ship and ties its captain and crew to the main mast. Rey stands farther back with her sword drawn and her aching hand pressed to her side. Kylo waits on the deck of the _Finalizer_ until the crew has been subdued. Then, and only then, does he bother to join them.

Rey makes a point of not watching him as he strolls onboard. She brushes soaking hair out of her face and notes that the rain seems to have slowed in its fall.

As Kylo speaks – threats and cajoling that she’s heard before – Rey studies the faces the crew. Men, bearded and hairless, with skins of all colors, stare back at her. Some of them ogle. Others glare. Each of their faces is distinct, and Rey is hit, for a moment, by a feeling of dread. She hasn’t seen her own face in a mirror or in the water in too long.

When Kylo finishes with his interrogation, it’s with his sword pressed to the captain’s throat. The moment before the blade draws blood, he turns and storms off into what Rey can only assume is the captain’s cabin, motioning two of the faceless crew to come with him. When he returns, the men are cradling a large, black trunk between them.

“Thank you for being so forthcoming,” Rey hears him say. Despite the politeness in his tone, she is unsurprised to see him return his sword to the captain’s neck.

She turns away from the carnage that follows. Instead, she watches the two crewmen carry the mysterious trunk across onto the _Finalizer_.

Before long, there is a hand on her shoulder. Rey looks up and sees her captain, blood splattered across his pale face.

“Back to the ship, Rey,” he says, nudging her forward. His voice, contrary to the norm, has gone soft, and his eyes look tired. Despite the strange, unpleasant nausea now tugging at her stomach, Rey does as she is told. She walks beside him as they make their way over to the side of the ship, then grabs one of the secured grappling hooks and hoists herself over the side. She lands lightly. Kylo Ren does not.

“Go attend to the doctor,” he tells her. “There are many men who will need his attention before the night is over.”

“What about you?”

Kylo blinks. “I’ll stay at the helm,” he says, after a moment’s silence. “We’ll want to find shallow water and drop anchor for the night.”

Rey nods in understanding. She offers her captain a tired salute before turning her back to him. She expects to hear him say her name, or otherwise call to her, but when she glances back over her shoulder, she finds that he’s already disappeared.

Ben is cradling a bucket in his lap when she comes stumbling in. He sets it aside at once and rises, wrapping her up in a hug.

“You didn’t fight,” Rey says, bringing her arms up in response. Ben’s back is, for the most part, dry, but his eyes are wide with fright.

“Too old,” he tells her, when they part. “And there’s no point in losing the ship’s doctor, or so I’ve been told.”

He sits her down on the operating table her and has her recount the battle for him. All the while, he strips one of his stiff, white shirts and wraps her wrist, eyeing her carefully as she winces. Once her story’s been told, he offers her what remains of the rum in his flask.

“You drew no blood,” he notes, tying off the wrap around her wrist.

Rey shakes her head. “I didn’t want to,” she admits. “There were more than enough men to handle it without me.”

Ben hums. “The captain’ll have you believe that to be a pirate means wallowing in blood,” he says. Rey grimaces and looks down at her injured hand.

“I never meant to be a pirate,” she tells him. “I only wanted to be free. Piracy just…happened.”

Ben huffs and mutters something that sounds like understanding. He takes back his flask when she offers it to him and sips at what remains inside.

There is a parade of men who join them as the night continues on. One by one, they come and settle on the operating table. Rey runs to the galley to retrieve more rum from the cook, who surrenders it willingly. She alternates between cleaning wounds and offering drinks until her legs are tired and her head is heavy.

The ship shudders when Kylo Ren finally calls for his crew to drop anchor. In the moments that follow, Rey slips from the doctor’s quarters and onto the main deck. The morning sun is peeking over the horizon, painting the world pink and yellow with its rays.

It’s only just climbed above the far away horizon when she feels a hand on her shoulder. Rey glances back and finds Ben staring at her, looking almost wistful.

“Sleep, Rey,” he tells her, before pulling away. “The world will be here when you wake.”

Rey lets him bully her back below deck, but not before glancing up towards the helm. Kylo remains standing on the deck, his hair plastered to his skull and his eyes tired. He spots her and almost raises a hand to greet her, but he turns away, instead.

Rey tries not to feel disappointed. She collapses into her hammock, a minute or two later, and lets Ben’s senseless mutterings lull her off to sleep.

*

She dreams of a world on fire.

There are trees around her and soft sand beneath her feet, but Rey does not stop to take them in. She runs, chest heaving, towards what she can only assume is the ocean shore. Above her, palm leaves crackle and fall to the ground, shriveling into naught but ash.

She breaks from the island jungle and stumbles in the sand, the sky in front of her a crimson red. Two men stand in front of her, the silver of their blades the only light things amongst the fire. They are locked in a desperate battle, their feet tripping lightly over the sand as one pursues the other.

A rush of heat along her back sends Rey moving again, but for all she runs, she never seems to move. The men remain just ahead of her, and the ocean just barely further away than them.

Then, one of the men falls. Rey gasps as his sword sails towards the sea, a silver bird that shines until it disappears. His opponent knocks him flat on his back and aims his sword at the man’s throat.

A crash sounds behind Rey’s head. She glances over her shoulder and sees the trees of the jungle fall, one by one, into smoldering piles of ash.

When she looks back to the men again, there is only one. His sword has been plunged into the beach’s sand, but there is no longer a body present to receive the blow.

Rey freezes as he turns and looks at her. He is tall and swathed in black, not an ounce of what could be called flesh visible to her. This is not what startles her, though. Rey looks into the face of this man and realizes, at once, that he has no face to speak of, only a black metal mask where his face should be.

Something begins to burn along her leg. Rey glances down and finds that she, much like the forest, has caught ablaze.

She wakes screaming.

Ben, who seems to have dozed off at his desk, is on his feet in a moment, hovering over her with wide eyes. Rey sits upright in her hammock and clutches her hands to her chest, gasping as she tries to catch her breath.

“What happened?” Ben demands, bringing his hands to rest on her shoulders. “Rey, what’s wrong?”

Rey closes her eyes and embraces the blackness. Ben curses under his breath and gives her the gentlest of shakes.

“Rey,” he says again. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,” Rey says without opening her eyes. “Just – just a bad dream.”

For a moment, Ben is silent. One of his hands drifts from her shoulder to her forehead, feeling, Rey assumes, for a temperature. She opens her eyes and finds his worried ones staring into hers.

There is a flash of fire in the corner of her eye, but it disappears in a moment. Rey furrows her brow, but says nothing. Ben keeps his hand on her forehead for a moment longer, then draws away.

“Go back to sleep, Rey,” he tells her, moving to sit at his desk. “You need to rest.”

“I don’t want to sleep,” Rey says. She swings her legs out of her hammock and lets herself drift a few inches off of the ground. “What time is it, anyway?”

“Just before noon rations,” Ben says. “Though I doubt cook’s actually awake enough to bring portions to everyone, anyway.”

Rey huffs out a noise that is supposed to be a laugh. She notices lines on Ben’s face and frowns as they grow tight. Her nose fills with the smell of smoke.

“What did you do before this?” she asks, the words slipping out of her mouth without her permission. “Before you were a pirate, I mean. Before you sailed.”

Ben looks at her, his wrinkles growing deeper. “There was never a time before I sailed, I don’t think,” he says. “And sometimes it’s hard even to remember what that was like. I was a naval man in the Old World. Served as a ship’s doctor for a few years. Don’t quite remember what went wrong, but the next thing I knew, I was sailing for the New World. Took a few more years for me to find Kylo Ren at the helm, but I never could keep my captains straight.”

He reaches for his flask and takes a long swig, idly patting his side. “The journal’s helpful,” he admits, wiping his mouth. “But I never really can get beyond that.”

Rey takes it from him a moment later and takes a drink, herself. “How long have you been here?” she asks, wiping a few drops of rum from her mouth.

Ben chuckles. “Longer than I care to think about,” he says. “Too long, really. I should have retired years ago.”

A prickle of unease settles in Rey’s chest, but another sip of rum is enough to dull it, for now. Rey passes Ben back his flask and leans back in her hammock. She watches as the old man takes another drink, then as he tucks the flask away. He starts to sing something, so low and soft that she can’t make out the words.

The last thing she sees is him reaching for his journal, a thoughtful look on his face.

*

It’s long past noon when she wakes again. Ben looks as though he has not slept, but he still manages to smile at her as she rises from her hammock. Rey manages to plant her feet on the wooden boards of the deck and stand, for a moment, before her entire body doubles over in pain. She bends at the waist and brings her arms around her stomach, only to feel the bones of her left wrist pop.

“I didn’t know I had this many muscles,” she gasps as Ben comes to help her. He guides her through a series of stretches that don’t quite help the pain, but they make it easier for her to move. All the same, it takes her quite some time to be able to stand up straight.

“This tends to happen,” Ben tells her as he turns his attention to her wrist. “You’re still green, young one. It’ll get easier with time.”

“I’m not sure I want it to,” Rey grumbles. She winces as Ben pops the bones of her wrist back into place, but otherwise doesn’t complain. The doctor offers her a wry smile, then nods towards the operating table. Rey turns towards it, expecting to need to settle herself on it, but instead finds a plate of food waiting for her.

“Cook brought it by a little while ago,” Ben says. “Eat up. The captain’s been calling for you.”

Rey lifts an eyebrow, but doesn’t hesitate to reach for the food. “What’s he need?”

Ben shrugs. As he goes to sit down again, Rey sees his journal resting, half read, on his desk. She hums, then lets her attention be consumed by her food.

The walk up to the captain’s cabin is a painful one, but she manages. The world outside the doctor’s quarters is bright, the sky a crystalline blue. Rey scowls at it as she makes her way across the deck. She straightens herself up when she reaches the captain’s door, running a hand over the mess that is her hair before moving to knock.

“Enter.”

The cabin is dark. Rey lets the door hang open for a moment, just so she can see. The shadows scurry away from the sunlight, but one remains firmly in place. Kylo Ren winces as the afternoon sunlight hits his face, then motions for Rey to close the door.

He looks as though he hasn’t slept. He sits behind his thick desk, free of his mask, coat, gloves, and boots. This version of the man, stripped down to the bone, is almost more frightening than the shadow that Rey met so many weeks ago.

She settles herself into the darkness and waits until her eyes have adjusted to speak. “You needed me, captain?”

Kylo grunts something that she assumes to be a confirmation. He stands and sways as he walks through the cabin, settling down on his knees in front of an object Rey can barely see. She moves and kneels alongside him. A brief brush of her hand over the object reveals it to be the trunk retrieved from the fallen _Togruta_.

Kylo Ren remains silent. When Rey glances over at him, she sees that his eyes are closed.

“Have you opened it yet, sir?” she asks, careful to keep her voice soft.

“I have.” His voice is a wreck. Rey almost winces at the sound, but she schools herself, her face the picture of impassive curiosity.

She hears the lock click open. Kylo Ren pushes the lip of the trunk back, then rocks back on his heels and lets her peer inside.

For a moment, Rey thinks the trunk is empty. She moves to reach in, to feel for something inside, but Kylo’s hand catches hers and squeezes, tight.

“Don’t touch it,” he snarls. He lets her go, as though she burns him, and goes to retrieve a light. Rey watches as he stumbles around the cabin, then returns her gaze to the depths of the trunk.

A moment before he brings a lantern to light, she sees it. The gasp of the fire does well to cover her own.

A mask stares up at her made of black, melted metal. Rey recoils at once, sickness brewing deep in her stomach. Beside her, Kylo Ren chuckles.

“What is that?” Rey demands.

“It’s the mask my grandfather wore,” Kylo says, kneeling once more. He lets the lantern rest in the lid of the trunk and reaches in to run his fingers over the mask’s wounded exterior. “He was the greatest pirate to terrorize the New World. Sacked more cities than any man before him and fought against the tyranny of the Old World colonies.”

Rey frowns. The man in her dream – tall, dark, and burning – didn’t strike her as a hero. “What was his name?”

Kylo looks back at her, his eyes wide. “You haven’t heard of Captain Vader?”

Rey shakes her head, but the name strikes at something deep inside her soul.

Kylo continues to stare at her, though a moment later, he huffs. “I suppose that’s not a surprise,” he admits. He picks up the lantern and lets the lid of the trunk slip shut. “Though I would have thought even a gutter rat like you would have heard something about him.”

Rey watches as he settles himself behind his desk once more. The lantern light paints his skin a sallow white.

“Maybe I did hear about him,” she says with a shrug. “I’ll admit, I wasn’t paying much attention to pirates across the sea. I was more focused on earning my next meal.”

Kylo hums, but seems unsatisfied. Rey watches as his eyes drift back to the chest and sees his fingers twitch.

A memory: Unklar Plutt, sitting behind a desk quite like this one; children scattered around at his feet, some of them his, others children of the street; a white smear of powder pressed across his mouth. Rey remembers watching his fingers twitch as he shouted at her to bring him more goods, more money, more, more, more.

Kylo’s voice hauls her back to the present.

“– why the Supreme Leader would want me to have it.” It’s clear he’s talking more to himself than to her. “I must have – he’s never been this kind before.” His eyes shine with the yellow light of reverence. Something stirs in Rey’s chest as he directs this gaze onto her.

“Thank you,” he says. “Without you, I’d never have gotten this chest.”

Rey is stunned into silence. The dreamy look doesn’t clear from Kylo’s face, but it mixes with something different as she tries to find her words.

“It was my duty, sir,” she says, at last, and watches as the dreamy fog is replaced by amusement.

“It was, wasn’t it?” For some reason, this seems to amuse him. Kylo motions her forward, staring at her until her hip is pressed against his desk. Then, he leans down and fishes one of his maps off of the cabin floor.

“We’re here,” he tells her, pointing to a spot some several knots from shore. “With luck, Mos Eisley will be a day’s sail out. We got lucky, finding the _Togruta_ when we did, and now we’ll be able to celebrate like we deserve to.”

The smile that breaks out over Rey’s face is almost painful. “So we’ll be making port soon?”

Kylo Ren nods. “You’ll be in the New World properly,” he tells her, rolling up the map and throwing it away. “Maybe I’ll let you have a few nights ashore, just so you can see what it’s like.”

Rey beams at him. “I’d like nothing better, sir,” she says. The prospect of going ashore – of being free, entirely, totally free – is enough to distract her from the mutable nature of Kylo Ren’s face. She turns away and misses the way his eyes goes soft, misses the gentle upturn of his mouth.

“It’ll be good for the lot of us,” he says, after clearing his throat. “Have you eaten yet today?”

Rey looks back at him over her shoulder and nods. All the same, her stomach chooses to rumble and fills the captain’s cabin with sound. Kylo Ren’s laughter soon covers it up, but not soon enough for Rey to prevent her blush.

“Go down to the galley,” he says, waving her away. “Tell the cook that I want my lunch portion to be doubled. Then come back and join me.”

Rey blinks. “Sir?”

Kylo leans back in his chair and shrugs. It’s a motion, Rey knows, that is supposed to make him look relaxed, but she thinks it only makes him look awkward. “We’re celebrating,” he tells her. “My victory and your freedom.”

It’s the kindest, Rey thinks, that the captain has ever been. She offers him one last glowing smile before exiting the cabin and has to keep herself from skipping all the way down to the galley. There is a lightness in her chest that drives memories of fire and fighting from her mind, replacing them with the promise of food and a future and, perhaps, good company.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think! XOXO


	6. Arc I, Chapter 06

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there are discoveries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can't chat long, as I've got a Halloween party to run to, but I hope you enjoy the chapter!

The crow’s nest calls out “Land ho!” just as the sun begins to set. Rey scrambles from her spot at the _Finalizer’s_ bow and finds a place for herself at the helm. Mos Eisley is no more than a speck on the horizon, but in the low light Rey imagines she can see the first sparks of lanterns bringing the city to life.

A memory: a girl running down the cobblestone streets of an Old World city, a stolen wallet cradled in her hands; light streaming down onto a darkened street from a townhouse window; a family, gathered around a table set for dinner.

Rey’s stomach growls. She shakes her head and turns her attention back to the _Finalizer_ ’s main deck. She moves lithely across the wooden boards and makes her way down to the galley, where the cook is preparing dinner.

“Not here for another special order, are you?” he grumbles as she comes into view.

“Nope.” Instead, she settles herself against his too-small counter. After a moment, he offers her a knife and points her in the direction of a pile of potatoes.

Their skins lay defeated at the lady pirate’s feet a short time later. As she goes up to ring the ship’s bell for dinner, she finds Ben and offers him a wide smile.

“Dinner time,” she says, nodding towards the stairs that lead below deck. After a moment she notices the journal still cradled in the doctor’s hand. He smiles at her but does not leave her side, even after she’s rung the bell.

“I need to talk to you,” he says as they head below deck together. “Would you like to take dinner in my cabin?”

Rey raises an eyebrow, but nods. She grabs one of the steel plates the cook offers her and piles it with undercooked potato slices and a clump of meat she has no name for. After promising to return for dishes later, she and Ben make their way to the doctor’s cabin.

Even after Ben closes the door behind them, he does not let the journal move from his side. He sits at his desk and lets Rey take the operating table, some of his good-naturedness draining from his face.

“Why did you want to come to the New World, Rey?” he asks.

Rey lifts up one of her potato slices, chewing on it slowly before replying.

“I used to work for a man named Unklar Plutt,” she says, at last. “He led a thieves’ guild that spread across several cities in the Old World. He took me in when I was young, and I spent a long time doing his dirty work for him.”

“You didn’t have a family?”

Rey shakes her head. “I was orphaned young. Never knew anyone who wanted to call me their own other than Unklar, and he didn’t even want to do that.

“As I got older, though, the jobs he sent me on became a little more…complicated.” Rey sighs. “The night before I left, he’d sent me off with orders to kill one of his competitors. I’d made it into the city where the man lived, and I was going to do it…but he had a family. He’d been eating dinner with his children, and I…I couldn’t do it.”

She shuffles and focuses her attention on her food. “If word got back to Unklar Plutt that I’d failed, he’d have beaten me black and blue. So I found a ship and decided that it was high time to get out.”

The wrinkles in Ben’s brow have become deeper, she notes, but he nods in understanding.

“I just wanted a new life,” she says, ignoring the guilt that threatens to rise up in her stomach. “I didn’t want to be afraid of what would happen to me if I stayed. I wanted to live my own life without any one telling me what I had to do and how I had to do it.”

“And now you’re serving on a pirate ship,” Ben chuckles. “The last stronghold of bloody democracy, or so they’ve been called.”

Rey tilts her head, confused, but Ben waves the thought away. He adjusts his grip on his journal but does not reach for his food. Rey takes another bite of potato and lets the silence settle in around them.

Finally, Ben sighs. “I want you to read this,” he says, nodding towards the journal. “It’s been a while since I read it all the way through. You do know how to read, don’t you?”

Rey shrugs. “I picked up a few things, here and there.”

“That’ll do.” Ben runs a hand through his sun-lightened hair. Rey frowns at the streaks of white she sees.

“If you have trouble understanding anything, you’re welcome to come to me and ask,” Ben says. “But you need to read it, Rey. There are things that have happened that I can’t explain, but I think – you’ll know what to do with all of this, if you take the time to understand.”

The furrow between Rey’s brows grows deeper. “I’m a little confused.”

To her surprise, Ben chuckles. “So am I, dear.” He pats the journal with a fond hand and, at last, turns his attention to his food. “We’ll be making port tomorrow, or so I’ve heard,” he says. “What will you do, once we’ve made it onto land?”

Rey recognizes the deflection and, after a moment, accepts it with a shrug. “I think I’ll explore a bit,” she admits, savoring the last bits of potato on her plate. “But I’ll come back to the ship, when all’s said and done. There’s no better way to explore the New World than by ocean.”

“So you’ve been told,” Ben clarifies. He casts another glance at the journal again, then takes a tentative bite of his mystery meat. Rey giggles as he sets it aside, smacking his lips as though to rid them of the taste.

“Read the journal,” he says again. “If freedom is what you value, Rey – if it’s what you want out of your life – I don’t think this life is the one you need to be living.”

Before Rey has a chance to ask him what he means, there’s a knock on the door. She sees Ben tuck the journal beneath a pile of medical instruments before rising to greet whoever’s come their way.

The shadows lounging over the main deck seem to have coalesced outside their door. Kylo Ren stands, tall and out of place, with his hand half raised to knock again.

“You weren’t in the galley,” he says to Rey, looking at her over Ben’s shoulder. “Is everything alright?”

Rey glances over at the doctor and sees him nod. “I’m fine,” she says, a moment later. “My wrist was just bothering me, that’s all.”

A flicker of suspicion passes over the captain’s face, but it disappears in a moment. “Come down below,” he grumbles, not quite an order. “The crew misses your company.”

“As they should,” Rey says primly. She descends from the operating table with the grace of a queen, stopping only to rest a hand on Ben’s elbow. “I’m the prettiest thing they’ve seen in months.”

Kylo blinks at her, mouth open, but Ben laughs. He pats her on the back and promises to join her shortly, then waves the both of his guests away. Rey strolls past her captain with her head held high and a smile lighting up her face. It falters when she hears the doctor’s door swing shut, but she steels herself and waits for Kylo to join her before she returns below deck.

*

There is little point in sleeping when night truly comes, as the captain informs his crew that they’ll be docking in Mos Eisley before the sun rises. Rey does the dishes with a particular haste after this announcement is made, which, in turn, leaves the cook laughing as she rushes through her job.

When she scurries up to the main deck and finds the port still a ways away, she slinks into the doctor’s cabin, disappointed and feeling silly.

Ben, she finds, has fallen asleep in his hammock, so she’s careful to close the door softly behind her. His journal remains tucked beneath a pile of his medical tools, so she fishes it out, then lights one of the small candles he keeps pressed into the wood of his desk.

His scrawl is messy, even in the opening entries, so it takes her some time to read. While her progress is slow, the details are interesting, and before long she finds herself engrossed.

*

 _Day 16: Aboard the_ Deliverance

_The pigeons brought a letter from Padme today. She remains in Cloud City, though I suspect it’s just as equally an inability to move as an unwillingness. She’s gotten on in years, though I suppose that means I have, too. I look forward to seeing her again._

_*_

_Day 21: Aboard the_ Deliverance

_Captain granted us rum rations early today, though I can’t fathom why. Not that anyone minded, of course; the whole of the crew is delighted. Perhaps the morale boost is needed, but I can’t help but have a bad feeling about whatever is yet to come._

_*_

_Day 23: Aboard the_ Deliverance

_Crow’s nest has spotted a ship on the horizon, though it seems invisible in the twilight. Its sails appear to be black, as does the wood of its hull. It took some time to convince the captain that it even existed. We shall see what comes of this._

_*_

_Day 24_

_Pirates._

_*_

Rey sucks in a breath and glances towards the door. Ben shifts in his hammock and lets out a gentle snort, but otherwise, it is as though the world has fallen silent.

*

_Day ?_

_The captain and the bulk of the crew have been murdered. I believe I have been allowed to live only because I have demonstrated an ability to write, and due to my credentials as ship’s doctor. No one has come for my journal as of yet, but I wonder if they will._

_*_

_Day still unknown_

_I spent today treating some of the pirate crew’s wounds. They are a quiet sort – nothing like I thought pirates would be. It’s hard to tell one man apart from the other, even though I know I must have seen the lot of them. It seems our men gave them quite the fight, though you’d never know it by looking at them._

_The captain seems young (though everyone seems young, anymore). I must wonder how a man such as himself fell into the ways of piracy._

_*_

_The ship is called the Finalizer._

_*_

A cry from above shocks Rey back into the present. She sets the journal aside, careful to return it to its hiding spot, then goes running up onto the main deck. The lanterns have been lit, and it seems most of the crew has joined her. They scurry about, passing rope lines from man to man while Kylo shouts orders from the helm.

“Rey!” he calls, the moment he sees her. “Up in the rigging with you! Bring in our sails!”

“Aye, captain!” Rey takes to the sky at once, moving hand over hand until she’s left the deck far behind. There are men already working on hoisting the masts, but they smile when she joins them. Together they make quick work of the large swathes of canvas. All the while, Rey spares glances for the port of Mos Eisley. Its glow is no longer relegated to the horizon; it seems a sparkling bonfire only a short distance away. The port, while dark, appears ready to embrace them, and Rey is more than ready to tuck herself into its folds.

“Drop anchor! Prepare the longboats!”

She scrambles out of the rigging and moves to join the men untying the anchor from its berth. While she runs, she sees Ben makes his way out of his cabin. She waves to him as she passes by and sees him wave back.

Once the anchor has dropped and the longboats have been stocked, Kylo Ren steps away from the helm. He lines up his crew along the main deck and paces before them, though even his rough exterior cannot hide the lightness in his step.

“Our business will wait until the morning,” he says, though he scowls as the crew begins to murmur happily. “You’re welcome to go ashore and do as you please, but I request that five of you stay behind to guard the ship. We have several important goods on board and I will not have them stolen due to a lack of vigilance.”

Rey and the rest of the crew nod in understanding. Kylo stops pacing for a long moment, then gives them all a final nod.

“Rey,” he says, after the crew has been dismissed. “Gather your things. You’re coming ashore with me.”

The smile that overtakes Rey’s face must be blinding, because she sees the captain blinks several times, as though to clear his head. “Aye aye, captain,” she says, snapping a smart salute before running off to the doctor’s cabin.

Her skin tingles as she gathers her pile of meager things into one of Ben’s unused medical satchels. She hears the cabin door open and close behind her, but she does not turn around, too busy marking the small pile of belongings she’s lucky enough to call her own.

“Rey.” Ben’s voice is soft and yet, still commanding. Rey turns and begins to offer him a smile, but falters when she sees his frown. He shifts from one foot to another, then beckons her forward.

Rey does not expect the old doctor to hug her. His arms are strong where they wrap around her, and he smells vaguely of salt, but he is kind and gentle and she does not hesitate to hug him back. “What’s the matter?” she asks, once he’s drawn away. “I’ll be back soon, I promise.”

“And I believe you,” Ben says, keeping his tone light. “But I find that I’m rather fond of you, dear, and this will be quite the adventure for you. You must allow an old man his little joys.”

Rey feels something in her heart grow soft. Leaning forward, she presses a kiss to the doctor’s brow. “I take it you will not be coming ashore?”

“No, not I,” Ben says, shaking his head. “I’ll help the men stand guard, as it were. I may not be able to do much, but I suppose I can offer them the pleasure of my company.”

Rey laughs. She kisses his forehead again, then returns her attention to her bag, careful to secure it once it’s slung over her shoulders. When she turns around again, it’s to find Ben staring at his hands.

“Take the journal,” he tells her, before she goes. “Maybe, between all the excitements, you’ll find more opportunities to read it.”

“Are you sure?” Rey glances at the tucked away moleskin and feels sadness settle in her stomach.

Ben nods. “Take it,” he says again. “You can always give it back to me when you return.”

Rey takes the book out from beneath its pile and tucks it into her bag with the greatest care. Out of the corner of her eye, she thinks she sees Ben smile.

“I’ll bring you back something nice,” she says, moving towards the door.

“Oh, do,” Ben says with a chuckle. “I’ve always been fond of monkey kabobs, so if you come across one –”

“I’ll buy one for you.” Rey offers him one last wave before opening the cabin’s door. The sight of him, illuminated by the soft candlelight, makes her heart ache, but she’s careful to pay the feeling no mind. She turns away before the door can shut, readjusts the satchel at her side, then makes her way over to Kylo Ren.

The captain has found his mask and hat and seems every inch the shadow who once opposed her in her cell. “Are you ready?” he asks, giving her a quick once over. When she nods, he hesitates, then offers her his hand.

“Up you go.”

Rey hangs on to his fingers for longer than necessary as she lifts herself into the longboat, but the captain doesn’t seem to mind. He clambers in after her, then lets two of his men follow, ordering them to lower the boat so they could all be on their way.

The port is not far away, but Rey does her share of rowing in order to get them there. Her worn-down shoes sink into the sand of Mos Eisley’s beach, and for a moment, the ground seems to wobble beneath her.

“You’ve spent too long at sea,” one of the crewmen laughs as he pulled the longboat ashore. His laughter cuts off when Kylo Ren glares at him, but Rey lets her own carry on.

The walk up the beach is an uncomfortable one, but she manages, occasionally reaching out for a crew man’s shoulder to steady herself as she goes. She catches Kylo’s arm, once, but is quick to let go; the tension in his arm makes her wary, even if she doesn’t understand why.

The docks, at least, offer her the familiar sturdiness of wood and gentle, glowing light from the lanterns leading into town.

“You know, for a pirate port, this seems fairly quiet,” she whispers, turning towards her captain.

Kylo doesn’t laugh, but offers her a wicked grin. “That’s because you haven’t really seen it yet.” With a nod of his head, he dismisses the other crewmen. Then, after a moment’s hesitation, he places his hand in the center of Rey’s back. “Come on,” he says, without looking at her. “Let me show you what it’s like.”

His hand – or perhaps the leather of his glove – radiates warmth. Rey resists the urge to sigh as it soothed the ache in her back and lets the captain push her forward into the ever-growing light of the port.

It is the women who greet them first. As they move from the docks to the streets of Mos Eisley, Rey sees a flurry of women move towards them, dressed in nothing but corsets and diaphanous skirts. She resists the urge to flush, but smiles as they come forward, letting them coo over her and pet her salt-hardened hair.

“Shoo.” Kylo waves them away, his nose in the air. He looks pointedly at Rey’s satchel as they move through the growing crowd. Rey places her hand on it and finds nothing missing, but understands the warning for what it is.

“What do I have that they’d want to steal?” she jokes. Kylo seems to color at this, but says nothing.

The crowd around them grows. Men selling sticks of tobacco and piss-colored cups of rum shout their wares from atop barrels along the streets; people of all colors and creeds pour out of ale houses, shouting in languages Rey can hardly recognize. She presses herself to Kylo Ren’s side as a horse and carriage go careening down the street, its driver absent but the women in back laughing with delight. Kylo’s hand moves from the small of her back to her shoulder and remains there as they continue on.

“Here,” he says, nudging her in the direction of a particular tavern. “We’ll stay here for the night.”

“What?” Rey looks up at him, surprised.

“We’re going to want to sleep eventually,” Kylo grumbles. He shoves a particularly loud man out of the tavern’s doorway and guides Rey inside.

If the town outside is full of light, then the tavern makes a game of filling itself with shadows. Voices seem to come from everywhere, and the only source of light is the fire burning in a clay fireplace some several feet from the front door. Rey wipes sweat from her brow and blinks, waiting for her eyes to adjust.

Kylo removes two men from the bar top with a subtle word and a brutal shove, then motions for her to take a seat.

“Grumpy, are you?” she asks, raising her voice as so to be better heard. Kylo mutters something under his breath, but the arrival of the bar maid distracts her.

“Welcome to the Queen and Carp.” A woman of about seven feet in height with hair the color of the sun peers down at them, two empty mugs in one of her hands. “What can I get for the two of you?”

“Rum, for both of us,” Kylo says, before Rey can speak. “And some of the stew.”

“Ran out of stew a while ago, captain,” the woman says. “Could get you some poussin wings instead.”

“What’s that?” Rey asks, her brow furrowed.

The bar maid looks at her once, then again with renewed interest. “You just come from the Old World, kid?”

Rey blanches and ignores the way Kylo chuckles. “I did,” she says, sullen. “What gave me away?”

“You mean besides not knowing what poussin is?” the bar maid snorts. “You have an accent thicker than mine.”

“I do?” Rey wrinkles her nose and frowns. “I hadn’t noticed.”

“No one ever does.” The bar maid considers her for a moment longer, then offers her something almost like a smile. “My name is Phasma. I came over a few years ago, myself. Took ages to get rid of the accent. I’ll get you a plate of poussin wings, and your rums; just give me a little while.”

She sails back into the crowd before Rey can thank her, though it’s impossible for her to disappear completely. Rey stares after her for a long moment, then turns back to Kylo Ren. Her captain seems to have busied himself with some marking on the counter, but the shadows aren’t enough to hide his smile.

“Don’t laugh at me,” Rey mutters.

Kylo’s grin widens. “I would never.”

Phasma returns a few moments later with a plate full of fruit and meat slivers. Rey blinks at it, confused; something in her expression leaves both Kylo and Phasma laughing at her. With a glare at both of them, Rey shrugs and tucks in. Juice from one of the slices of mango spills over her lips and onto her fingers, and she chases it, sucking it off and marveling at the taste.

“It tastes a little rotten,” she admits, giving one of her fingers a casual lick. She hears Kylo’s laughter catch in his throat and looks up in time to see him swallow, hard. With a tilt of her head, she motions him towards his rum.

She plows her way through the plate of food, letting Kylo steal the occasional bite. The acid from the fruit tingles on her tongue and makes her giggle, which, in turn, prompts Phasma to bring her more. Kylo, though he smiles and drinks alongside her, seems to grow sterner as the night progresses. It’s not until Phasma’s refilling her tankard for the second – or is it the third? – time that Rey asks him what’s wrong.

“It’s nothing,” he tells her – clearly a lie.

Rey takes another sip from her tankard. “If you’re not going to be honest with me,” she says, setting her rum aside, “then I can go find someone who will be.” She teeters off of her seat and bumps into someone in the crowd. Steady hands right her at once, only to be slapped away by gloved ones. Rey looks up and finds Kylo Ren towering above her.

“You’re not going anywhere,” he says, voice a little unsteady. “It’s not safe to be in a place like this alone.”

“Right,” Rey looks through the crowd and sees Phasma holding down the fort by the fireplace. “I won’t be alone! I’ll go talk to Phasma.” As gently as she can, she removes Kylo’s hand from her arm. “Don’t worry about me,” she says, giving his fingers a squeeze. “I’ll come right back.”

He doesn’t look ready to let her go, but someone pushes in between them, and their contact breaks. Rey seizes the opportunity and swims through the crowd, ducking beneath flailing arms and around bodies until she’s come to Phasma’s side.

“Hello!” she chirps, leaning against the fire place. Phasma looks down at her with a raised eyebrow and amusement written into her features, but says nothing.

“The captain is grumpy,” Rey says, loud enough that the bar maid can hear her but soft enough that she can pretend like she’s whispering. “I don’t think he should have any more rum tonight.”

“I can think of another person who shouldn’t have any more rum,” Phasma chides. “Do you even know who you’re drinking with, little girl?”

“Don’t call me that,” Rey grumbles, crossing her arms. “Everyone must be little to you.”

Phasma hesitates, then concedes the point. “In size and personality,” she adds.

Rey snorts. “For your information,” she continues. “I do know who I’m drinking with. That’s Captain Kylo Ren. He’s in charge of the _Finalizer_.”

Phasma’s eyebrow creeps higher. “And what has an Old World girl heard about the _Finalizer_?”

“Oh, I’ve more than heard about it,” Rey says, puffing out her chest. “I’ve sailed on it! I’m a pirate, just like the rest of them.”

The amusement drops out of Phasma’s face so quickly that Rey thinks she’s seeing things. She frowns, then stands on her toes and pokes at Phasma’s face. A gentle hand brushes her away.

“I think,” Phasma says, leaning down to speak more quietly. “That you and I need to talk.”

Rey blinks. “Why?”

“Because there are some things you should know about the men on that ship,” Phasma mutters. “But if we’re going to go, we need to move. Now.”

Rey glances over her shoulder and sees a man corner Kylo Ren at the bar. For a moment, she wants to go to him, but the look on his face is murderous and she immediately feels shy.

“Come on,” Phasma says, taking her hand. “Let’s go.”

Between one moment and the next, Rey finds herself swept out of the Queen and Carp’s shadows and back into the well-lit Mos Eisley streets. Phasma uses her height to her advantage, pushing through the motely crowd as she drags Rey along. Rey, once she manages to find her feet, trails after her, jogging to keep up with the bar maid’s pace.

“Where are we going?”

“Somewhere quiet,” Phasma tells her. “Now do me a favor and keep your mouth shut until we get there.”

The bulk of the crowd seems to fade away as the women continue to move. The lights around them grow dimmer, and the shadows friendlier. Noise from jungle outside the town grows louder, until the buzz of the crowd has been replaced by the buzz of cicadas and the croaking of toads.

The sky, still dark above them, is dappled with stars. Rey slows her pace and busies herself with staring upward until she hears Phasma huff.

“I suppose this is far enough,” the bar maid says. “No one really likes to come out this far.”

“I suppose the jungle’s not really what people come to Mos Eisley for,” Rey says absentmindedly.

Phasma snorts and shakes her head. “Now pay attention,” she says, directing Rey’s gaze back to her. “You said that you’ve been sailing with the men on the _Finalizer_?”

Rey nods her head. “They look the trade ship I was on…three weeks ago? A month ago?” The dates are muzzy in her head. “Kylo – the captain let me live because I begged him not to ship me off to the Old World. I’ve been working as part of his crew ever since then.”

“And you’ve noticed some strange things about them, haven’t you?”

Rey hesitates, then nods her head. “I don’t really think about it, anymore,” she admits. “I’ve kind of gotten used to it.”

“Of course you have,” Phasma scoffs. “That’s what happens when you sign on with the likes of them. They make you think that what they’re doing – that what’s happened to the lot of them – is natural.”

Rey tilts her head and feels the sand start to move around her. Phasma takes pity on her, for a moment, and motions for her to sit on the ground.

“Have you heard the name ‘Elijah Snoke’?”

Rey nods again.

Phasma pushes a strand of pale hair out of her face and rubs her eyes, as though fighting off a wave of exhaustion. “I met him, once,” she says. “He’s not a human man. I don’t believe in the Old Gods, or even any of the new, but if they do exist, I’d swear he’s one of them. The way he can make men do as he commands, the way he erases memories – it’s not natural. If you stay on one of his ships for too long, it’ll start to happen to you, too.”

Rey frowns and bites her bottom lip. “That sounds like a ghost story,” she admits. “Like one of the tall tales Unklar – my old boss – used to tell us in order to keep us indoors.”

“But you’ve seen it,” Phasma insists. Her eyes are wide with what Rey thinks may be fear, but Phasma’s face is hard to read in the shadows. “Can you tell me the names of the people you sail with?”

“Ben,” Rey says at once. “And Kylo, of course. And…” she trails off and bites her bottom lip again. She starts at the taste of blood. “There…there once was a man named Hux?”

“But you don’t know anyone else,” Phasma prompts.

Rey frowns. Her hand drifts down to the satchel still wrapped around her shoulders, where Ben’s journal lies, tucked away. “I don’t know if I believe you,” she admits. “But I don’t know anyone else’s name.”

Phasma shakes her head. “I wouldn’t toss it up to your bad memory, little girl,” she says. “Though if you stay on that ship, you’re more of a fool than I thought.”

“And why would I leave?” Rey demands. “They’re good to me; Ben is good to me; Kylo Ren is….” she trails off again. The wind off the ocean, for a moment, grows cold, and she has to rub her arms to drive the goosebumps away.

“Think about it,” Phasma says, her voice soft. “Elijah Snoke is not a man who wants good things for anybody, no matter how that crew treats you. It doesn’t matter if they’re kind to you now; if they get far gone enough, they’ll hurt you. _He’ll_ hurt you.”

Rey shivers again, but says nothing. When she glances over her shoulder, it’s to see Phasma staring past her, over the ocean and out to the broad, full moon.

“When I first came here,” she says. “All I wanted to do was explore. It’s a new world, you know; it’s not just a title. If you get stuck in one place too long, though, you sort of…forget those sorts of things.”

Rey finds her mouth twitching in the smallest of smiles. “Where did you want to go?”

Phasma blinks, surprised, then looks down at her toes. “There’s a port a ways north of here: Mandalore? Apparently a cult of warriors lives on the island. Always wanted to meet them, just to see if they were real.”

“Somehow, I’m not surprised.” Rey turns back and watches the waves as they crash onto the shore. She thinks she hears Phasma chuckle, but doesn’t turn around again.

“You can’t let yourself get caught up in things, Rey, be they people or otherwise,” Phasma says, after a long moment of silence. Rey continues to watch the waves, though she hears Phasma’s footsteps begin to walk away, each of them made heavy by the sand.

“Don’t stay out here too long, Rey,” Phasma calls. “I’m sure your captain will be looking for you.”

Something in her heart strings. Rey closes her eyes and lets the sound of the waves wash away the noise Phasma makes. Only when her head has filled with ocean water does she dare to glance back, and by that time, Phasma is long gone.

There is still alcohol bubbling in her stomach, so Rey doesn’t question the nausea that immediately threatens to overtake her. She sits down in the sand, hard, and lets the water lap at her feet, leaning back to better count the stars that pop out of the sky above her.

Ben’s journal is heavy in her satchel, but she does not take it out. The night, she thinks, is too heavy, and all she really wants to do is sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you thought! XOXO


	7. Arc I, Chapter 07

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which decisions are made.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to thank all of you again for the lovely comments you're leaving! They really make writing this worthwhile. I hope this chapter is an interesting one for you.

Rey doesn’t know how long she sits on the beach. Eventually, though, the tide comes in too high, and she’s forced to make her way into Mos Eisley’s well-lit streets. The crowd has thinned since she left, leaving only a few scantily dressed women and even fewer men. The streets grow confusing, but Rey does her best to make her way back to the Queen and Carp. When she doesn’t manage that, she begins to stumble towards the Mos Eisley docks.

She flinches when a hand closes around her elbow. She whirls, punching her attacker in the stomach, only to have him catch her hand on the rebound and hold her close. It takes her a moment to realize that the dark figure is none other than Kylo Ren.

“Where have you been?” he snaps, without letting her go. “I looked for you everywhere, Rey; what happened?”

His mask, Rey notices, has been abandoned, and his hat has been lost to the crowd. He looks, for lack of a better term, a right mess. She giggles, a quiet thing, but he hears her and gives her a shake. “This is not funny,” he says. “Rey, I thought – I thought –”

“It’s alright, captain,” Rey says. She twitches her fingers in Kylo Ren’s grip until he’s forced to let her go.

“Kylo,” he says as his hands drop to his sides. “While we’re here, call me Kylo.”

“Kylo.” She’s said it before, but the name sits strangely in her mouth. “I’m okay, I promise. No one hurt me. I just wanted to sit by the ocean for a while.”

Her captain snorts. “You aren’t sick of it yet? I know I am.” He hesitates, then reaches out and wraps his arm around her shoulders. “Come on, we’re going back to the inn. Can’t let our rooms go to waste.”

Rey hums in agreement and lets the dying lights of Mos Eisley distract her as Kylo guides her back. The Queen and the Carp is empty save for Phasma, who remains standing behind the bar. She offers Rey a tired smile as she hands over their room keys, but doesn’t mention their rendezvous or anything of the like.

“Who was the man you were talking to earlier?” Rey asks her captain, the memory flickering in the back of her mind.

The arm still wrapped around her shoulders goes tense. “I didn’t bother to learn his name,” Kylo admits with a huff. “But he’s one of Snoke’s men. I didn’t expect to see him here, if I’m being honest.”

“It’s good to be honest,” Rey muses. Her brow furrows. “What did he want?”

Kylo says nothing. When she looks up at him, Rey sees the hints of exhaustion building around his eyes. She almost retracts her statement, but waits, instead. They walk to the doors of their rooms in silence.

“I wanted to wait until morning to tell you,” Kylo says, as they go to part. Rey, her hand on her door handle, stays patient while he struggles with his words. “Snoke is coming,” he says, at last. “Here. Soon. My contact says that he wants to meet you – wants to look over the artifacts that we managed to gather, too.”

Rey feels her heart sink in her chest. Kylo runs a hand through his long, dark hair, and looks for all the world as though he wants to collapse onto the floorboards.

After a long moment, Rey nods. “Okay,” she says. “That’s – okay. We’ll deal with it when it comes, won’t we?”

She waits, but Kylo Ren doesn’t reply. She takes her hand from her door handle and reaches out, taking his gloved one into hers. “It’ll be alright,” she tells him. “It’ll just be business as usual until he arrives. That’s how you usually do it, right?”

Kylo lifts his eyes from the floor and manages to look at her. After a moment, he chuckles. “You know, sometimes I forget that you’re new,” he says. “It feels like you’ve been around all my life.”

A flush starts to work its way up the back of Rey’s neck, but she’s quick to fight it down. “You need someone like me in your life, anyway,” she says, all bluster and burnt-out booze.

“Aye,” Kylo says with a shy smile. “I think that I do.”

She leaves him like that, standing in the hall with a smile on his face. Rey fits the key to her room into the lock and turns it, still fighting back the threat of the flush before it can take over her face. Just as she goes to close her door, she hears a soft, “Rey?”

Despite everything, she glances up.

Kylo Ren is not a man who could ever be described as soft, but in the tavern hallway, face cast in moonlight, Rey can think of no other word that fits him better. He’s midstep, as though making to follow her, but he’s stopped and shoved his hands into the deep pockets of his coat.

“Yes?”

It may be a trick of the lighting, but Rey thinks the tips of his ears go red. “Sleep well.”

The smile that takes over her face is luminous, and Rey makes no attempt to hide it. “You too, Kylo.”

Before she can make an even bigger fool of herself, Rey lets the door to her room drift shut. She turns and leans back against the salt washed wood and listens, eyes closed, as Kylo Ren breathes on the other side. It takes him a long time to walk away, but his footsteps are heavy when he does. Rey hears the lock of his room click open and doesn’t breathe until she hears it shut.

She sinks to the floor and buries her face in her hands, all while her heart threatens to beat its way out of her chest.

*

Morning comes too early, as does the noise. Rey wakes with a mild headache and a rotten mouth and finds herself groaning into the tavern’s too-thin pillows. The bruises from her misadventures in the rigging have not faded, and the pain, while less, still persists. It takes several minutes of coaxing to get herself to rise from the bed.

This alone leaves her blinking and fighting back a laugh. The thin pillow and thinner mattress are luxuries she hasn’t had in ages. Rey flops back down onto them only moments after rising and buries herself in sheets, disregarding the heat as she lounges.

She doesn’t know how long it takes for Kylo to come knocking on her door, but she figures the sun has risen a little higher in the sky. She’s slow to move, but by the time he starts his second round of knocks, she up and able to throw the door open and greet him with a smile.

“Morning!” she chirps. Kylo stares at her from the other side of the threshold, looking as though she’s smacked him upside the head. Rey glances down at herself and takes a quick mental stock: shirt, pants – no trousers, it’s too hot for that – but otherwise, she’s as decent as any of the men on the _Finalizer_ have been. Her hair is a curtain down her back, and it weighs heavily with humidity and sweat, but she does her best to pay it no mind.

“Is something wrong?” she asks, watching as Kylo opens his mouth, closes it, then opens it again.

“No,” he sputters, after a long moment. “No, nothing’s wrong. I was just – wondering if you wanted to get some breakfast?”

As if on cue, Rey’s stomach growls. She stifles a laugh and turns away, off to find the satchel she’d brought from the ship. “Give me just a minute,” she calls over her shoulder. “There’s no way I’d say no to breakfast.”

Kylo makes a weak noise, but says nothing more. The sound of Rey’s lock clicking shut makes her turn her head, but she finds that Kylo has not joined her in her rather cozy room, but that he’s opted to wait for her in the hall.

She finds herself feeling disappointed and has to force herself to move forward.

Breakfast in the Queen and Carp is as noisy as dinner, but not nearly as dark. The woman behind the bar top goes by the name of Zam and offers Rey and her captain two identical bowls of oats, both covered with slices of banana. Rey doesn’t wait to begin to eat, tipping back her bowl before she’s even sat at a table. When she surfaces, Kylo Ren is shaking his head. His sips are more delicate, and for a moment, Rey is tempted to laugh at him.

“So,” she says, wiping some residual oat smear from her face. “What are we doing today?”

“We have a meeting with a dealer at noon to arrange a sale for our goods,” Kylo says. “Due to Snoke’s impending arrival, it seems we’ll be here longer than I anticipated. There will be time to look around, if you’re interested.” His tone seems hesitant, and his gaze drops into his bowl.

Rey’s heart flutters in her chest. “There’s no way I’m not going to explore,” she says with a grin. “What’ll you do, though?”

Kylo huffs, almost managing to make it sound like a laugh. “I’ll follow you.”

And he does. They have several hours before they’re due in the market place, so Rey takes to Mos Eisley’s cobblestone streets, peeking her head into brothels and butcheries and blacksmiths’ shops. When this bores her, she makes her way into the jungle. She laughs as she takes to the tall, thin trees and listens as Kylo curses her from the ground. She smiles down at him, but turns away before she can see him smile back.

They’re nearly late to their meeting with Greedo Rodian, but a fair bit of scrambling ensures they make it. Rey sees several of the faceless crew stationed around Mos Eisley’s town square, boxes on their shoulders and set at their feet. As she goes to stand alongside them, she feels Kylo’s hand brush against her own.

“Come with me,” he says, nodding towards their client. “It’ll be good for you to start learning the trade.”

Rey follows him without hesitation.

Kylo, to her surprise, is not the one who runs the sale. One of the faceless crew separates himself from the crowd and comes to stand at the captain’s side. Though their client directs all their questions to the captain, it is this man who answers. Rey listens as he talks, all the while stealing glances in Kylo’s direction. His hand remains on the pommel of his sword, and more than once he steps forward to break up an argument, but otherwise he allows his crewman to handle the deal without interruption.

Greedo leaves them after a short while, grumbling something under his breath about “thieving pirates”, but Rey sees him dig into his pockets and offer Kylo a small sack of gold coins before he goes. After he’s left, the crewman turns to Kylo with a satisfied hum.

“We’ve sold the lot of it, capt’n,” he says, then seems to remember that he should be looking at his feet.

“Indeed we have.” Rey squirms at the satisfaction in Kylo’s voice, but he doesn’t seem to notice. “Leave a few men with the goods to make sure none of it gets stolen. We’ll not be leaving port for a few days, and I want to make sure we stay on good terms with everyone here.”

Rey sees a flash of surprise pass over the crewman’s face, but besides an “aye, capt’n,” he says nothing more.

The square fills slowly as the day goes on. Before long, Mos Eisley is full of men and women, over half of them selling some sort of food. Rey catches a glimpse of muskrat on a stick as she walks, her fellow crewmen disappearing off down one alley or another. She sees stalls selling sea nuts and urchins; mangos and bananas seared in a large pan, swirling in a sauce darker than she’s ever seen. She’s watching a woman stir lumps of dark brown sugar into the mix when she feels a hand come down on her shoulder.

She would accuse Kylo Ren of laughing at her if he were any other man. Instead, she wipes the drool from the corner of her mouth and does her best to look composed. “What?”

The corner of Kylo’s mouth twitches up into a smile. “Are you hungry?”

Rey’s stomach growls. “Oh, no,” she says, shaking her head. “Not at all.”

Kylo raises an eyebrow. His hand returns to her arm, gentler than the time before. “Well, then, I suppose I won’t need to buy you anything to eat.”

Rey’s stomach growls again. She looks down at it, too-thin hands rubbing a non-existent gut, and just barely hears Kylo sigh. “Come on,” he says. “But we’re not spending a lot of money tonight.”

He buys her one of everything from each of the merchants they come across. Rey eats like a queen, trails of sugary syrup dripping down her fingers and mixing with juice from monkey meat and pepper kabobs. Kylo eats, too, but much less than her. He spends most of his time, Rey thinks, staring at the crowd, or talking to men in dark corners when she’s too occupied to care.

Her mouth is full of spun sugar that tastes like peaches when she catches him staring at her. She licks the taste of the treat off of her fingers and smiles at him, making her way through Mos Eisley’s crowd to come to his side. He looks pale, she realizes, after a moment, and her smile gives way to a frown.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Kylo Ren shakes his head, and the apples of his cheeks flush. It’s an endearing look, though Rey has to bite her lip to keep from saying so.

They walk together for a while, until the noise of the square dies down and the cobblestone turns to dirt beneath their feet. Before she realizes it, they’re on the docks, staring out across the pale gold sea. A fisherman or two looks up as the duo passes them by, but they never stare for long.

Rey seats herself at the end of one long pier, her legs just long enough that she can skim the ocean waves with her toes. She takes off her shoes and sets them to a side, then draws patterns on the water, watching the ripples as they cast themselves out and are then carried away by the sea. Kylo remains standing for a little while before sitting at her side.

“What do you think?” he asks, his voice nearly overwhelmed by the crash of the waves. Rey looks at him and sees the sun settle itself in his dark hair.

“Of the New World?” She licks a bit of sugar from her lips. “There’s more food than I could have imagined.”

Kylo Ren cracks a smile.

“Lots of people, too.” Rey’s gaze drifts down to her feet. “It’s like walking into a dream, or into the Old World if the Old World had been flipped upside down and shaken until everyone went mad.”

That makes Kylo laugh. “So it’s good, then?”

“Different,” Rey says with a nod. “But different is good.”

“Better than your old life?”

Rey lets out a chuckle, but it is not a happy thing. “Anything would have been better than that,” she says. “I wasn’t lying to you when I said I’d rather have died than go back. This world, no matter how strange, offers me freedom.”

She glances up and sees something sad flicker through Kylo’s eyes. It’s gone in an instant. “You’ve not told me much about your life before,” he says, though his voice is too calm to be casual. “What do you remember?”

Rey resists the urge to frown. She stares back out across the ocean and watches as the sun starts to sink below the horizon.

“I remember some things better than others,” she admits. “I remember Unklar Plutt catching me, one day, when I hadn’t given him all my money. I’ve still got scars from where he beat me.” She grimaces and shifts, as though the wounds still hurt. “I remember – I remember the other children, who were there when I was first brought in. I remember –” Her voice drifts off, and her brow furrows. “I don’t exactly remember when I decided to run away.”

It’s strange, she thinks, looking away. There’s something lingering in the back of her mind – a man sitting at a kitchen table, a knife in her hand – but whenever she tries to grasp at it, it disappears. “Maybe it was always just meant to happen, you know?”

Kylo huffs, but says nothing. When Rey looks up at him again, his eyes have gone dark. Her frown deepens as she chases failing memories.

“What was it like for you?” she asks, trying to ignore her frustration. “You’ve never said where you came from.”

Kylo’s darkness doesn’t fade; if anything, it grows deeper. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Rey moves her gaze away from his face and down to her fingers. The ocean continues to whisper around them, though the air seems to grow cold.

After a while, she hears Kylo sigh. “I didn’t mean it like that,” he says. “It’s just – not something I like to think about.”

“Bad childhood?”

“Something like that,” he mutters. In the bright, end of day light, he looks like a child, and Rey doesn’t hesitate to reach out and take one of his hands in hers. She doesn’t look at him, keeps her gaze firmly fixed on the horizon, but she still sees the breath catch in his chest. Her own heart is pounding, but she refuses to acknowledge it.

“Is that why you let me live?” she asks.

She hears his winded chuckle and fights back a rush of heat. “No,” he says. “No, I let you live because I wanted to see what you would become.”

“Oh?” Rey looks back and sees the predator shuffling in the shadows of Kylo Ren’s coat. “And what am I now?”

For a moment, there is hesitation. Then, her captain reaches out and lets an ungloved hand cup her cheek. “You are now what you were then,” he tells her. “Perfect.”

Their noses brush before Rey realizes that she’s moved. Kylo’s hand goes tight on her jaw the moment before she kisses him, but when her lips meet his, he melts.

She keeps her eyes open as his slip shut. The hand on her jaw moves into her hair and tugs, gently, as though Kylo’s convincing himself that she’s actually there. Rey chuckles into the kiss and lets her eyes close for a moment as they break apart, then kiss again.

There’s a cough from down the dock, but neither one of them hear it. Rey gets lost in the taste of Kylo’s lips and in the strokes of his tongue until one of the Mos Eisley fishermen shouts, “Get a room!”

She feels more than hears Kylo growl. One of his hands leaves her hair and goes for the sword still attached to his hip, but she stops him. Their lips break apart, but she kisses his nose before shimmying up and onto her feet. She glares at the fishermen (who now refuses to make eye contact), then takes her captain by the hand.

“Come on,” she says, nodding towards town. When Kylo looks confused, she laughs. “It’s not bad advice,” she says with a wink.

It takes her walking several feet away for him to get the message. The moment he does, his long legs are carrying him ahead of her, though their joined hands ensure that she’s dragged along after him.

She doesn’t see Phasma once they reach the Queen and Carp, but then again, she isn’t seeing much besides Kylo Ren’s tall form stalking towards his room. The moment the door closes behind him, his lips are back on hers. Rey shivers under his touch and forces him to shrug out of his coat. It pools like a second shadow at their feet.

His mouth is magic on hers, chasing away all of her thoughts as his shaking hands work to drag her out of her shirt. He’s too tall for them to do anything practical while standing, so once her white shirt has been laid out like a banner on his coat, they go tumbling towards the bed. Kylo hits it first and hauls Rey onto his chest, his hands settling on her hips for a moment before moving up to palm her breasts. Rey keens as she goes back to kissing him, her hips rocking against the erection pressing through his dark pants.

He gasps her name as she drives down on him, his mouth falling open, but Rey doesn’t stop. Her body, so used to her own ministrations, finds satisfaction in his; she drags one of his unpracticed hands down to her clit and has him rub her through her pants while she rides him, their clothes another layer of friction as she drives herself higher. It’s selfish, and she can feel him squirming, feeling him building, but she can’t bring herself to stop.

Her first orgasm is a miracle with half of her clothes still on. Rey does her best to muffle her scream in Kylo’s mouth, and he does his best to swallow it, chanting her name like a prayer as she falls into a world of white light.

She rolls off of him, after that, and lets him hover over her. As though from a distance, she watches him shimmy out of his pants and throw them across the room. His hands are gentle as he coaxes her out of hers. His shirt is the last article of clothing to go between the two of them – Rey’s long neglected undergarments, and it seems her captain is of the same mind. As she comes back to herself, she finds herself staring at the redness of his cock in between languid kisses. The man is shaking, but he does not touch her until she tells him to.

“Kylo,” she whispers against his mouth. “I need you.”

It is not words that leave his lips, but a long, anguished whine. He enters her, eyes open to watch her face as he slides in to the hilt. It takes Rey a moment to adjust to his size, but she does, and then they’re moving again.

She’s already working her way towards her second orgasm when he starts gasping her name. His hips piston against hers until, at last, he presses their foreheads together and comes. Rey feels him shudder and kisses his nose, then his lips, all while teetering on the precipice. She slips a hand between the two of them and, as Kylo slumps, comes herself. She flutters around his cock and leaves him moaning, all while she paints stars on the room’s wooden ceiling.

He pulls out of her and falls to the side, his breath still coming hard in his chest. He looks at her with eyes glazed over with pleasure and sleep and reaches out as she comes down to run a hand through her hair.

“We’re gonna rule the world, you and I,” he says, his words slurring together. Rey, still trying to come back to herself, turns to him with confusion written into her brow.

“Just like my grandfather,” he says, eyes slipping shut. “Wait and see, Rey. Wait and see.”

Sleep claims him not a moment later and leaves him looking young in the room’s vast darkness.

Rey watches as his breathing slows, each of his muscles twitching as he sinks deeper. Her own mind is hazy with pleasure, but there are goosebumps on her skin and confusion building in her soul. When sleepiness threatens to push her down onto the soft mattress, she fights it off. Instead, she slips out of the bed.

She finds Kylo’s dark shirt and slips it on, letting it settle just above her knees. Then, as quietly as she can, she rummages through her satchel and finds Ben’s journal. With one last sidelong look at her lover – is that what he is, now? – Rey slips from the room and into the tavern’s hall.

It’s quiet, but there are still a few candles filling the hall with their gentle glow. Rey sits down just beside her room’s door and flips through the journal, watching as Ben’s writing grows sloppier and sloppier. The lack of dates becomes consistent as one entry blends into another. Words begin to blend together until, at last, Rey comes across one of the journal’s final entries.

*

_I found this journal with the rest of my things today. Skimmed through a lot of it – author never states his name, but he must have been an educated man. If it’s here, though, and not with whoever the poor soul was, then I suppose he won’t be needing it anymore. There’s plenty of space left; maybe I can write something of my own._

*

_My name is Ben. My name is Ben. My name is Ben. My name is Ben._

*

After that, there’s nothing but empty pages. Rey feels something grow tight in her chest and holds the journal close, steadying her breathing as the night sweeps on around her. Something creaks, and she jumps, staring at Kylo’s door with wide eyes and a pounding heart. She waits, but no one emerges.

She glances down at the shirt she’s wearing and tugs it further down her thighs. Then, as quietly as she can, she sneaks passed Kylo’s door and down the hall until she reaches the empty bar top. Phasma is still behind the counter, despite the fact that all of her customers seem to have gone to bed.

“You’re still around,” she says as Rey comes forward. “What are you wearing?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Rey mutters. She sets Ben’s journal down on the bar top and slides it over to Phasma. “I’m scared, Phasma.”

The bar maid stares at the journal, but doesn’t pick it up. Her eyes narrow to slits. “Has that bastard of a captain hurt you?”

“What? No.” Rey shakes her head. “It’s just – something’s not right with my head.”

Phasma gives her a quick once over and snorts quietly. “You’re the one who said it, not me.”

“I’m serious!” Rey hisses. She throws another nervous glance towards the inn’s hall. “This journal was given to me by one of the _Finalizer_ ’s crew. The man who wrote it was a doctor, and all of his journal entries make it look like he doesn’t remember who he is anymore.”

“I told you that was what happened.”

“I _know_.” Rey works not to roll her eyes. “But it’s happening to _me_ , Phasma.”

At this statement, Phasma goes still. She sighs and sets the glass she’s cleaning aside to rest her elbows on the bar top. “So what’re you going to do about it?” she asks. “I’m not sure if sleeping with the captain will help you keep your memory, but if that’s the solution you’re happy with –”

“Can you – not bring that up anymore?” Rey says through gritted teeth. There’s a flush burning on the back of her neck, but she knows that Phasma won’t see it. “Look, I don’t think he’s a bad man. Even if he is, there’s some part of him that’s good, I know there is. But all that said….” She glances down the hall again. “If I have to lose my memory to stay on that ship, then I think it’s time for me to find somewhere else to go.”

It hurts for her to say it, but fear is fluttering beneath her skin. She clings to the memories still in her head and wonders, briefly, if Kylo Ren doesn’t want to talk about the past or if he simply doesn’t remember it anymore.

She can’t stay. No matter what she feels for the man, Rey knows that she cannot stay.

Phasma blinks, long and slow like the ship’s cats from the Old World. Then, she nods. “One of the boys I served tonight is heading out before the sun rises,” she says. “He’s a trader, takes tobacco and the like in between some of the islands. He’ll get you out of here, at least.”

The bubble of relief in Rey’s chest nearly overwhelms her. It settles alongside a nice pile of guilt and leaves her feeling dizzy, but she does her best to work through it.

“What was his name?”

“Hell if I know.” Phasma shrugs. “But his ship’s the _Falcon_. If you go soon, you should be able to catch him.”

Rey nods, then pushes off of the bar stool. “I’ll be down in just a minute,” she says, turning away. “Will you still be here?”

She hears Phasma snorts. “It’s not like I’ve got anywhere else to be.”

Rey smiles as she makes her way back up to Kylo Ren’s room. She keeps her steps light as she goes and idly tugs on the hem of his shirt, breathing slowly both for calm and for his scent.

It’s only when she reaches his door that she comes up short. Her smile drops. Her hand is heavy on the door handle.

Ben’s journal remains on the bar top, though, and she holds it firmly in her mind. Rey gently pushes the door to Kylo’s room open and slips inside.

The man is still passed out on the bed, his snores filling the room with noise. Rey slips past him and starts to gather her clothes, shrugging off his shirt so it lands on the floor. Then, she moves for her satchel.

Kylo grumbles something from the bed. Rey freezes. She watches as the moonlight from the window passes over his pale face and notices, again, just how young he looks. The guilt that she’s working so hard to ignore rears its head again, but she shoves it away.

He’ll understand. He’s a pirate. Real pirates are never meant to stay in one place for long.

The threat of Snoke and of her own failing memory lingers in the back of her mind, but Rey brushes them away. She picks up her satchel and slings it over her body. Then, she makes her way over to the bed.

She lingers over Kylo, one hand hovering above his hair as she fights the urge to pet it.

“You know,” she says, coming down to press a kiss to his forehead. “We really could have been great, Kylo. Just not like this. Maybe some other day.”

Kylo murmurs something in his sleep, but he doesn’t wake. Rey hesitates for one moment longer, then turns away.

Phasma nods approvingly when Rey emerges from the long hallway. Rey adjusts her satchel over her shoulder and repeats the name of the ship again. Her feet are tingling with the urge to run away.

The look on Phasma’s face is neutral, but understanding. When Rey dawdles, she motions towards the door.

“Go on,” she says. “It’s your only opportunity. You’d better take it.”

Still, Rey lingers. The words slip out of her mouth before she can stop them. “Come with me.”

Phasma blinks.

“You should,” Rey says, her hands twisting the satchel’s handle. “You said you always wanted to travel. Come with me, and we’ll both be able to.”

Phasma looks ready to argue, but she doesn’t say a word. She glances around the inn for a long moment, then looks back to Rey.

“Why are you asking _me_ to come along?” she asks. “Your captain is still sleeping in his room; I’m sure he’d make better company.”

Rey has to work to fight back a snort, but the noise comes out sad. “You want to know what he said to me, when he was still awake? ‘We can rule the world, Rey’.” She wrinkles her nose and presses a hand to her brow. “I don’t want to rule the world, Phasma. I just want to be free.”

Phasma nods, understanding. With one final look around the Queen and Carp, she makes her way out from behind the counter. “Wasn’t going anywhere working here, anyway,” she mutters.

The women walk out of the tavern together. They duck into alleys, trying to disappear, but Rey still feels the weight of an invisible stare following her. It lingers in the dead center of her neck and burns, even once she and Phasma have reached the Mos Eisley docks.

The captain of the _Falcon_ is awake, as is the rest of his crew, but none of them are happy. Rey weasels her way onto the ship and into the captain’s quarters while Phasma causes a distraction and finds herself face to face with a man more beard than face.

“Hello, sir,” she says, offering him a short bow. “My friend and I would like to offer you our services on your ship.”

“Bah!” The captain narrows his eyes. “Like I haven’t seen you around. You’re off the _Finalizer_ , aren’t you? What makes you think I want to take a mutinous runaway and her lackey aboard my ship?”

Rey narrows her eyes. “Because we ask nothing but food and transport. We want none of the proceeds from your sales; we just want to be out of Mos Eisley before the sun rises.”

The captain laughs again. “So you really are running away?” he says. He considers her for a long, steady moment, then glances past her towards the door. Rey glances back, too, and sees that Phasma has joined her.

“What have you done to get my crew so riled up?”

“Challenged your quartermaster to a fight,” Phasma says, as casual as she pleases. “He’s lost some teeth, but otherwise, I think he’ll be right as rain.”

The captain whistles. “You took down Chewie? Well, I’m almost impressed.” He looks at Rey again, adjusts his hat, and sighs. “I’ll drop you off at Mos Espa,” he says, pushing himself away from his desk. “No further. If the First Order tries to give me trouble because of you, missy, I’ll drop you off sooner than that!”

“Understood, sir,” Rey says, nodding her head. “Thank you, sir.”

The captain huffs and starts for the door. “Name’s Captain Solo,” he says. “You, big one: you help hoist the anchor. Little one, head up and start loosening the sails. I want to be away from this damned hellhole before I see even the smallest sliver of sunlight!”

Rey and Phasma exchange quick glances, then rush to do as they’re told.

*

Rey stays in the air as the _Falcon_ sets sail from Mos Eisley’s bay. She watches as the sky starts to pale, though she doesn’t cast her gaze east for the sunrise. She watches as the windows of Mos Eisley’s houses and taverns become smaller and as the _Finalizer_ begins to shrink.

There’s a pang in her chest that she cannot ignore, but there’s no point in turning back. Rey blows a kiss back towards Mos Eisley, then focuses on her duties, listening as Captain Solo’s right hand, Chewie, shouts orders in a tongue she can barely understand.

She’s not looking at the bay when a white, slim ship settles at the dock.

She’s not there when Kylo wakes and finds his bed empty and her things gone.

She’s not there when he meets Elijah Snoke and William Hux at the docks, looking like a man gone mad, or a beast risen straight from hell.

She’s not there when William Hux gives the order to burn Mos Eisley to the ground. She doesn’t know that, in a desperate attempt to find her, Kylo pushes himself through the flames, watching, waiting for her to emerge as though she is a rabbit in a hole. She doesn’t know that, in a moment of forethought, Hux procures the dock’s ship register and finds the name ‘Han Solo’ marked down as having left that morning.

She doesn’t seen Kylo’s eyes grow cold when Hux tells him that his father is likely the one who smuggled the girl away.

She can’t imagine Elijah Snoke, an impenetrable being swathed in cold darkness, giving the order to pursue.

All Rey knows is that by midday, she can see smoke rising from the port where Mos Eisley used to be. She descends from the _Falcon_ ’s rigging and finds Phasma, who has also cast her gaze back to the city that used to be her home.

“What do you think’s happened?” Rey asks, first to Phasma, then to the captain. Phasma’s lips are thin, and the worry lines around Han’s eyes are dark.

“First Order,” the old man grunts, his hands steady on the wheel of his ship. “It’s a good thing you got out when you did, girl. They’re not a group you want to get mixed up with.”

“Do you know them?”

Han’s laugh is brutal; it sounds wrong, coming from his mouth. “Oh, I know them,” he says, though he doesn’t look at either of the women. There is a moment of silence, and the smoke from Mos Eisley winds higher.

Then:

“The First Order killed my son.”

*

Rey also doesn’t know that he chases her.

The _Finalizer_ , Snoke, even William Hux – they chase the _Falcon_ for days without catching up. Whether this is work of Han’s or just the Fates, no one knows, but after three weeks, Snoke orders them to cease their efforts. By this time, Rey and Phasma have left the _Falcon_ and are working on a fishing boat headed for Mandalor.

Rey doesn’t know that Kylo, while following his master’s orders, keeps a scrap of her clothing tucked away in his desk. She isn’t there when Hux is taken on as his first mate and quartermaster; she isn’t there when Ben is hung from the yardarm as a traitor; she isn’t there, late in the night, when Kylo traces patterns on his ceiling and wonders if she ran away or if she was stolen.

She isn’t there when he finds his father and runs him through with a sword. She doesn’t hear the words that come before Han’s forgiveness, words that say “she left you” followed by “let me help you”.

She doesn’t know that Kylo chalks it up to his father’s wish to hurt him, nor that he whispers her name like a prayer every night and begs the Fates, his master, anybody who will listen to, one day, let him find her.

Rey gets gone, good and far away from the First Order, and she stays gone.

**End of Arc I**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> .... :)  
>  Let me know what you thought! XOXO


	8. Arc II, Chapter 01: Finn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wherein new characters are introduced.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome, lovely folks, to Arc II! I hope you like the direction that the story takes; while it may seem different for now, there's no guarantee that it will remain so for long.

**Several Years Later**

The port of Takodana is dark, the moon above her townhouses and taverns blocked by a wispy collection of clouds. What few windows are lit belong to sleepless citizens, kept awake by noisy children or by the desires of flesh and blood.

The ship that sails into Watendlath Bay bears witness to them all, though she comments on none.

The captain of this ship is dressed in black, his form only noticeable when backed by the thin light of the moon. His crew moves across the deck without a sound, ropes like silk in their hands. Their heads are all bent down, as they are unwilling to cast their gaze to the stars – or perhaps unable.

The man at the helm is the only person who bothers to look up, save for the captain himself. He is also the only member of the crew who seems to bear a face. A shock of ginger hair is just visible in the darkness, and it distinguishes him amongst the crew of indistinguishables. He steers the ship so her stern runs parallel to the shore. The city becomes a dancer, awaiting the first move of its invisible partner.

The captain lifts one of his hands, a sleeve falling back to reveal a pale wrist. His men go still. A cloud passes over the moon, and the bay is wrought with silence. Shadows pass over the face of the faceless men, though one, nearest the cannons, has his brow creased with fear.

The captain’s hand drops. A man runs below deck. Then, without a word, the ship’s cannons begin to fire.

Takodana has a fort to defend itself with, but it is the middle of the night, and the lit windows of the city do not belong to soldiers. The first round of cannon fire goes unchallenged, as does the second. The homes closest to the sea are quick to catch fire as cannon balls rip through their walls. The smell of gun powder fills the air. The citizens of Takodana begin to scream.

The captain raises his hand again, then lets it drop. The third round of cannon fire tears through the city. The ginger behind the wheel of the ship lets out a barking laugh, the only sound to be heard amongst all the screams. He guides the ship closer, adjusting and readjusting as her cannons require.

The faceless men who are not at the cannons have their hands on their swords. The longboats attached to the sides of the ship are prepared for lowering, and the men pile in. As the fourth round of cannon fire carries through the city, the first of the boats are lowered.

The crew of the _Finalizer_ approaches the city without a sound. They slip out of the ocean and into the streets, their cutlasses slashing through soldiers and civilians alike. Goods are systematically collected and brought back to the longboats; dead bodies are piled off to one side, not to be touched unless used as necessary shielding.

The governor of Takodana is not in her home when the pirates arrive to burn it. There is no evidence of where she has fled to, but the pirates have not been ordered to seek her out; they have only been ordered to destroy. The governor’s mansion burns. The whole of Takodana is reduced to smoke and ashes.

The pirates return to their ship just as the sun begins to rise. Several trips are made; the first to deliver goods and the last to deliver men. The captain in black has not moved from his post, has not engaged in the fighting. As the sun rises, his pale face becomes clear, cast in the red light of morning. The ginger at the wheel has not moved, either. His bottom lip has been bitten raw, and the blood has slipped between his teeth and down into his beard. He looks to his captain and offers him a bright red smile.

On deck, the man with worry in his brow shifts.

The worried man watches as the ginger descends, pacing in front of the crew and spouting words that make sense to no one but himself. His steps seem patient, but the whole of the crew know it to be no more than an illusion.

The ginger counts their number aloud; a check, the worried man knows, for mutineers. He looks down when the ginger man stops in front of him, too aware of his bloodless shirt and his pristine hands. The ginger, however, does not linger.

Everyone, including the worried man and the captain, are surprised when the crew is revealed to be one greater in number. The newest crewmember is not at the end of the line of men, but rather positioned just off center. The worried man watches as the captain descends onto the main deck, stopping before the newcomer and reaching forward to lift his chin.

“Who are you?” the captain asks, his voice deceptively cool. “What makes you think you’re welcome aboard my ship?”

The man in question swallows hard. The black of the captain’s glove is a wound against his sun-kissed skin. “No point in getting slaughtered,” he says, nodding back towards the decimated town. “Figured I’d sign on with the winning side.”

The captain narrows his eyes, considering. After a long, long moment, he lets the man’s chin go. He walks away without a word, calling the ginger man to his side with a wave of his hand. They murmur to one another for a moment, then return their attention to the crew.

“Welcome aboard, then, sir,” the ginger says with a smile. “We will have to…induct you as a proper member of our crew. If you would come with me, please.” He reaches out with a pale hand but does not let the newcomer take it. Instead, he yanks the newcomer’s arm behind his back and marches him down into the bowels of the ship.

The captain stares after them, his eyes flashing with cruelty. Before he follows, he dismisses the crew. They scramble about the ship, preparing to cast off, but the worried man lingers. He waits until the captain has disappeared from view, then makes his way away from his crewmates to take up a position next to the stairs leading into the hull of the ship.

It doesn’t take long for him to hear the snap of the whip. It takes longer for him to hear the newcomer start to scream.

*

The _Finalizer_ is not a ship known for its sympathy. The appearance of any freed slaves or runaways amongst its crew is coincidental, and ironic: a position of crewman is less cruel than slavery, perhaps, but the rule of the captain and the first mate is not to be questioned.

The man with worry written into his brow – his name long lost to the waves and the faceless crew – prefers his serviceship to the threat of slavery, but only slightly. The rock of the ship is calming, and he rejoices in it, even as his hands chaff and his sense of self erodes.

Now, however, as he watches the golden-skinned man wander below deck, his back torn asunder by the first mate’s cat-o-nine tails, the worried man feels stirrings of his old self just beneath his skin.

The golden man finds a home for himself next to the worried man’s hammock and sits. He’s a strange sight in the grey light of the below deck, but the worried man is drawn to him, nonetheless.

The crew of the _Finalizer_ is a faceless mass. If he left the golden man alone, he, too, would lose himself. That thought is, somehow, enough to drive the worried man forward.

“Who are you?” His voice is raspy from disuse, but it gets the golden man’s attention. He looks up sharply, his mouth drawn tight.

“Does it matter?”

The worried man hesitates, then nods. “Names are important. Tell me yours.”

It’s testament to the man’s newness that he’s quick to reply. “My name is Poe,” he says. “What about yours?”

The worried man lets out a short laugh. “Poe,” he repeats, tasting the name on his tongue. “I don’t have a name. I can’t remember if I’ve ever had one.”

The grimace on Poe’s golden face is almost sympathetic. “I’ve heard that happens,” he says, more to himself than to the worried man. He goes to lean back against the ship’s hull but stops himself with a wince.

The worried man frowns. “I heard you screaming,” he says, motioning towards Poe’s back.

Poe, for a moment, looks amused. “They wanted me to tell them things I didn’t have answers for,” he says, and his voice is casual enough that the worried man almost believes him. “But let’s not talk about that. Tell me: where do you come from?”

The worried man bites his lip.

“Let me rephrase,” Poe says, after a moment. “What can you remember?”

It comes back to him in pieces, as though through a thick fog.

“I lived on an island,” he says, at last. “I was sworn into the service of one of my kin, meant to follow him to the ends of the earth, if necessary. These white men had started coming for us by then, but the man I followed made a point never to be taken. But one day…” he hesitates, then runs a hand over his head. “It blurs. One day, I am serving a brother, the next, a master, and the next, a captain. I could not tell you how I got here; it’s simply that I am.”

Poe is silent. The worried man does not look him in the face; he stares at his feet and counts the blisters that have formed there.

“You’ve never been your own man,” Poe says, at last.

“Perhaps,” the worried man says with a shrug. “Perhaps there was a moment, but for now, I’m just another hand.”

Poe hums, but says nothing. His hands move to a spot around his neck and linger there, as though a part of him is missing. “I have a name for you,” he announces, a moment later.

The worried man tilts his head. “I didn’t know I was looking for one.”

To his surprise, Poe smiles. It’s like watching a campfire burning in the night: comforting and slow. “Well, I’ve gotta call you by something,” he says. “How about Finn? Finn, like finish.”

The worried man – Finn – tries the name on for size. It sits heavy on his lips, but it makes him start to smile. “Finn,” he repeats. “I like it.”

Poe’s smile grows all the brighter until Finn is forced to look away from it. “Good.” Poe nods his head. “Now, are we going to be missed if we don’t go back up on deck?”

“It’s unlikely,” Finn says. “The captain will be in his quarters, and the first mate will be at the helm. The captain is the only one who can tell any of us apart, and even that’s just a passing interest.”

Poe hums. “Does your captain have a name?”

Finn’s laughter startles even himself. “Have you not heard it?” he asks. “Is the _Finalizer_ less well known than I thought?”

“On the contrary,” Poe says. “But I want to hear you say his name. Otherwise, he’s just a myth. Myths have this kind of legendary power that goes away once you realize that they’re just real men.”

Finn hesitates. The captain is not a man to be trifled with. He has not expressly forbidden the speaking of his name, but it is rarely said by the crew. Only the first mate dares to speak it, and even then, it is only the moniker that the captain has given himself.

“He’s called Kylo Ren,” Finn says, after a moment.

Something hardens in Poe’s golden eyes. “Kylo Ren,” he repeats. The name hangs in the air like a bad omen, and Finn finds himself glancing towards the stairs, as though the mere mention of it could bring the man himself down on them.

Then, to his surprise, Poe laughs. “Well, then,” he says, tucking his hands behind his head. “It seems I’ve found myself on the right ship.”

Finn tilts his head in his confusion, but he doesn’t ask any questions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you thought! XOXO


	9. Arc II, Chapter 02

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is burning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all of you who leave such kind comments, and to all of you who are reading this story. I hope it can provide some sort of soft entertainment amongst all the bad news in the world. 
> 
> Just for note: BB8 in this story uses they/them pronouns. I didn't mess up the grammar. BB8 in this story is nonbinary.

Finn acts as Poe’s ‘supervisor’ over the next several days, though the first mate and the captain both look at him funny for it. It takes the lot of them less than a day to realize the Poe doesn’t need any help. He takes the rigging as though he was born to it, playing amongst the sails with a loose grip as he hangs out over the sea. His confidence speaks to experience, but Finn does not ask where that experience came from. He simply plays at being a mentor, watching the man work as the ship sails onward.

“Where are we going?” Poe asks, one day, his hand dropping onto Finn’s shoulder while the rest of him hangs in the rigging. Finn casts a wary eye towards the poop deck and sees the captain scowl, but he is quick to turn away.

“We’ve got a fair amount of goods weighing us down,” Finn says. “The captain usually takes us to Mos Eisley after a run like that.”

Poe frowns. “Mos Eisley? I thought that place was burnt to the ground.”

“It is,” Finn nods. “Have you heard what the Royal Navy calls us, though? Cockroaches. Cockroaches can live anywhere, Poe, even in Mos Eisley.”

Poe quirks his lips as though he’s found something funny, but he doesn’t say what. The first mate calls out an order before Finn can pursue it. He watches as Poe zips back into the rigging, moving so quickly that he’s almost impossible to see.

He glances over towards the helm again and sees the captain murmuring something in his first mate’s ear. An uneasy feeling settles in his stomach, but Finn ignores it and returns his attention back to his duties.

It’s Poe who calls out “Land ho!” when Mos Eisley comes into view. The first mate – who Poe’s said goes by the name of Hux when he’s not the authority on the _Finalizer_ – shouts for the bulk of the men to go below in order to prepare the stock they’d taken from Takodana. Finn waits for Poe to drop from the rigging, then both men disappear below deck.

“What happens once we make berth?” Poe asks, careful to keep his voice low. Finn glances at him over a trunk of ruby colored fruit and blinks.

“Two teams will be assigned to go and makes deals for the goods,” he murmurs back. “The captain and the helmsman will make their way to a tavern or an inn or something of the like, and gods only know what they’ll do there. The rest of us are more than likely to stay here.”

Poe raises an eyebrow.

“Are you really surprised?” Finn says, unable to keep the laughter from his voice. “We’re the faceless crew. We’re not allowed to leave the ship; the captain says it’s unnecessary. He hardly goes ashore, himself, unless it’s to conduct business.”

Poe opens his mouth to speak, then closes it again. “You’ve never snuck off the ship, then?” he asks, at last. “You’ve never gone ashore to drink, or found a woman and paid her to love you for an hour?”

Despite himself, Finn blushes. “I don’t. If any of the others do, I am unaware of it – as are the captain and first mate.”

This makes Poe laugh, though Finn cannot fathom why. “Well, if you stay on the ship, I am likely to, as well.”

“Might be better for your safety,” Finn admits. One of the faceless crew looks back at them, an emotion similar to annoyance written into his otherwise neutral features. Finn and Poe exchange another brief look, then go back to their assigned duties.

By the time the sun is kissing the horizon, the _Finalizer_ and crew are secured in port. The crew waits and watches as the captain and first mate descend to the dock. The helmsman has dressed himself in a fine cloak and wears an array of gleaming jewels on his fingers.

Finn looks out at the remnants of what he knows used to be a bustling pirate town. The occasional alley is filled with white, bursting light, but the rest of the city has succumbed to darkness. Homes and taverns that once stood proud still have rubble on their front steps, or have chunks missing from them entirely. He doesn’t know how much time has passed since the port was sacked, but the air still smells like gunpowder and flame.

Finn swallows hard as he watches the captain and first mate disappear.

Only when they’re faded into the shadows of the city does the crew return below deck. Finn turns to go along with them until he catches sight of Poe. The golden man has one of his hands wrapped around the _Finalizer_ ’s rigging, supporting him as he stares at the broken city.

“Is something wrong?”

“What? No.” Poe shakes his head.

Finn’s eyebrow twitches upward, but he doesn’t contest it. He leans out over the side of the ship along with Poe and finds his reflection staring back at him in the bay’s choppy water. He cannot make out the details of his own face, but he can see the exact lines of Poe’s.

“What happened here?” Poe asks, softly.

Finn shrugs. “There are a lot of rumors,” he admits. “The first mate says it was the Royal Navy that did it, just to prove that they could.”

“Hux, Finn,” Poe interrupts. “His name is Hux.”

Finn blanches at his casual use of the name, but amends his statement. “I’ve heard other things, though. Rumors from some of the older crew. There are some who think they remember the _Finalizer_ burning Mos Eisley to the ground.”

He looks up and sees Poe’s face tighten, though it is half hidden by darkness. He looks back into the water and watches as the ocean carries his reflection away.

It is a while before Poe speaks again. When he does, he turns and watches Finn sidelong, as though he’s nervous – though Finn doesn’t understand why.

“Could you help me with something?” he asks. “It’s – it’s a little complicated, honestly, but it’d be good to have you along.”

Finn raises an eyebrow.

“If you did, I’m sure we could get you something good out of it,” Poe continues. He runs a hand through his curls and pins Finn with his stare. “I can’t tell you all the details until everything’s played out, but I swear on my life that I’ll do whatever I can to help you out.”

Finn takes the stance of this golden man into account. He shines, lit from the back by the last rays of sunlight, and bites his lip, though more gently than the first mate ever has. Finn finds himself staring, and in that, he is lost.

“What do you need me to do?”

A weight Finn had not seen lifts itself from Poe’s shoulders. His smile gleams. “Come with me. We’ll have to move quickly.”

Finn doesn’t question him. He moves when Poe moves, sneaks when Poe sneaks, and finds himself altogether relieved. There is a freedom to his movements, now, and an excitement in his heart that hasn’t been there is a while. It remains, even when Poe leads him to the door to the captain’s cabin.

“What’re you doing?” Finn sputters as Poe presses against the door.

“I’m gonna go in there,” Poe whispers. “But I’ll be out in a minute. I need you to stand watch. Once I’m back, we’re only going to have a few minutes before we need to run.”

“Run?”

“Run,” Poe nods. “We’re abandoning ship.”

Finn makes a small noise, but even he cannot tell if it’s in affirmation or fear. Poe seems not to hear it. With a final glance towards Finn, he makes his way inside, then closes the door behind him. Finn pulls himself up to his full height and leans back against the wall nearest the door, arms crossed over his chest.

If he’s lucky, none of the crew will come up from below deck.

He hears something fall from inside the captain’s cabin, followed by Poe’s soft swear. What part of him doesn’t flush, does its best not to roll his eyes.

There is a flicker of movement from the mid-deck staircase. Finn tenses as a man makes his way onto the mid-deck, looking around, as though suspecting trouble. The man spots him, glancing over him, then doing a double take. Finn’s jaw tightens as the man starts over towards his side.

“That’s close enough,” he says, voice soft, when the man is only a few feet away.

His crewmate does not reach for his sword, nor does he go to sound the alarm. Instead, he raises his hand, as though to touch Finn’s face.

“I can see you,” he says, voice ragged with disuse. “I can _see_ you.”

Finn hesitates, then reaches out and pushes the man’s hand away. “Go back below deck,” he says. It is not an order, but the man treats it as such. Finn watches until his head has disappeared below deck, then waits for the inevitable fall out.

It never comes.

Poe emerges several moments later. One of the captain’s satchels hangs at his side, but Finn does not bother to ask him why.

“Is there anything you want from below deck?” Poe asks.

Finn shakes his head.

“What about any weapons? Anything you want at all?”

“I have my sword,” Finn says, patting it where it rests at his side. “And a pistol in my boot, though I don’t see why we’ll need it.”

“Okay,” Poe says with a nod. He is without weapons, Finn notices, but he doesn’t seem to care. “That’ll be enough for now. Let’s go.”

“Where will we go?” Finn follows Poe as he makes his way to the side of the ship, where the gangplank is settled on the dock.

“I have a contact waiting for us at a nearby inn,” Poe says. “We’ll meet them there, and then make our own way.”

Finn accepts this at once. Poe is quick to scurry onto the dock, and he waits, impatient, while Finn makes his own descent.

To feel his feet hit wood plank not pinned to the _Finalizer_ is an abnormal experience, so much so that Finn wants to run back to the safety of the ship. He does not. Instead, he turns to Poe and lets his breathing grow steadier with every step he takes away from the ship and sea.

Poe moves as confidently through the streets of Mos Eisley as he did the _Finalizer_. They duck into alleys to avoid a group of women, red swathes of ribbon worn round their waists and pistols tied up in their garters. A gaggle of would-be soldiers comes, after that – “Men in uniform that isn’t theirs,” Poe murmurs, but they carry on their way. It’s darker and quieter than Finn would have ever guessed, but he lets Poe lead him on, past the full taverns in favor of one that looks like it hasn’t seen guests in years.

“What’s this?”

“The Queen and the Carp,” Poe says, glancing at a sign that’s been riddled with bullet holes. “They’ve built it from the ground up, or so I’ve been told. There was hardly anything left after the city burned.” He looks Finn in the face and offers him a wink. “Don’t worry, buddie. I’ll keep you safe.”

Finn, who has spent most of his life with worry written into his brow, finds this an impossible request. The duo ducks out of a nearby alley and takes a moment to straighten themselves up. Then, with Poe in the lead, they enter into the tavern.

The light inside is dim. Poe smiles at the woman who seems to be playing barmaid, all the while linking his arm with Finn’s. He leans over the counter and whispers something in her ear that makes her giggle, then point to a shadier corner of the bar. Poe thanks her, digs into his pocket for a gold coin Finn knows he stole, then guides them both through the generous night crowd.

The figure already sitting at the table in the corner takes a sip of their beer, their large hat obscuring their face. Poe slides into the seat across from them, leaving Finn to take the one in between. All parties at the table wait several moments in silence before any one of them speaks.

“Do you have it?” The brimmed figure asks, at last. Their voice has no gender – at least, not one that Finn can tell.

“I do.” Poe nods. “Did General Organa send a ship, or is it just you, for now?”

“Just me,” the figure says. “She couldn’t spare a vessel, so I had to catch a fishing boat out of Cloud City.” They glance sidelong at Finn and take another sip of their drink. “I suppose you’ll be wanting me to mention your new friend in my report?”

“Yes. This is Finn.” Finn doesn’t so much as smile as he does awkwardly grimace. “He helped me get what I needed off the ship.”

“And now Kylo Ren will notice two of his crewmen missing instead of just one,” the figure grumbles. “I’m not saying I’m surprised, Dameron, but really?”

Poe shrugs. “I’m not sorry.”

“I’m shocked.”

“Excuse me,” Finn says through gritted teeth. “But who are you, exactly?”

The brimmed figure snorts. “You let him drag you into this without him telling you what’s going on?”

“I did,” Finn nods. “Because I trust him. You, on the other hand, I do not.”

The figure laughs. They lift the brim of their hat to reveal a surprisingly young face. “My name is Bing Lee,” they say. “But you can call me BB. It’s good to meet another victim of Dameron’s charms.”

Finn lifts an eyebrow, but Poe snorts. “Be nice.”

“I am being nice,” BB says with a shrug. “We work for the Royal Navy, Mister…?”

“Finn.”

“Finn.” BB nods. “Your friend and I are lieutenants under one General Organa. Her war to capture or cripple the great Kylo Ren has recently become ours.”

“Any particular reason?” Finn asks. “And what are you going to do to the crew?” He thinks of the man who touched his cheek and wishes, for a moment, that he had thought to ask his name.

“The reasons are personal,” BB says. “As for the crew – that depends on the individual. General Organa may not like pirates, but she is an understanding soul.”

“We ask because we’re looking for a pardon,” Poe interrupts. “If you tell General Organa about him, make sure to tell her that Finn’s been a friend to me. I promised that I’d help him, however I could.”

BB stares at Poe for a long moment, then lets out a sigh. “Dameron, she’s going to want to have a long talk with you.”

“That’s nothing new,” Poe says, his smile full of devil-may-care ease. “But regarding the matter we have on our hands: how exactly do you intend to get this little treasure of mine out of Mos Eisley before our dear captain realizes it’s gone?”

BB huffs and leans forward, their hand tight on their glass. “There’s a ship leaving in the middle of the night,” they say. “Not Navy, but with some of our men on it. We’ll be able to get aboard without any problems. Even you,” they say, directing their gaze towards Finn. “So long as we move quickly and quietly, I believe that we’ll be fine.”

“Good.” Poe adjusts the satchel where it hangs on his shoulder. “Then what say you that we get out of this place?”

BB nodded, but just as the trio goes to stand, a shout comes from the front. Finn goes tense as he hears the captain – Kylo Ren – shouting at the top of his lungs, his curses colorful but his threats less so. His voice is accompanied by an inhuman shout, followed by a crash that implies a sword has ruined the tavern’s bar top.

Someone in the crowd begins to scream.

“Damn!” BB downs what remains of their drink, then drags their hand across their mouth. “We’ll have to split up. You two: sneak out the back and make your way down to the docks. The ship you’re looking for is the _Isis_ ; I’ll meet you there.”

Without another word or so much as a glance backwards, BB lunges past the duo and into the shouting fray. Another crash follows their departure.

Finn and Poe exchange quick glances. Finn sees Poe gulp and wonders, for a moment, just how much of the destruction at Takodana the man actually saw. Then, on a strong impulse, he takes the golden man’s hand. “We’ll see them at the docks,” he says, then drags Poe though the back door and into the Mos Eisley streets.

The air is thick with humidity and the sound of screams. Finn, for a moment, is back in Takodana, and finds himself automatically reaching for his sword. He doesn’t let go of Poe’s hand, just drags him through the over-full streets.

“What exactly did you take?” he demands, without glancing back.

“Funny you should ask.”

A cannon ball goes whizzing past their heads. Finn wouldn’t put it past whoever’s at the helm to be aiming straight for them, be it on Hux’s terms or their own. When he glances back, it’s to see a building go up in flames and Poe’s apologetic smile.

“I may have taken his grandfather’s mask.”

Finn nearly chokes. “You took Captain Vader’s mask? Why?!”

“A blow against morale?” Poe says. “But really: it’s the most precious thing Kylo Ren has. There were bets to see who’d be able to get it first.”

Finn looks back again, this time to glare. Another cannon ball whizzes by overhead.

“Joking!”

“Sure you are,” Finn mutters.

They try to fight the bulk of the crowd but find it impossible. Soon they, with the rest of Mos Eisley, are running into the jungle, doing their best just to hold on to one another and to stay on their feet. Finn resists the urge to turn around and look back, instead focusing instead on the steady grip Poe has on his hand. He hears the sound of a child crying and does his best not to wince.

Then, a cackle echoes through the trees. Most of the civilians look up, expecting to catch the flash of a monkey’s tail. Finn, however, does not. He comes to a stop at once, narrowing his eyes as he stares into the darkness. There is a flicker of red, then another cackle, and then –

“Run.” Finn tugs Poe back around.

“Wait, what? Where are we going?”

“Poe, run!”

William Hux is standing atop a tall rock, two torches in hand. The land around his feet glows with red fire.

“He’s mad,” Poe says, his voice breaking.

They run against the flow of people fleeing Mos Eisley until there’s no one left. The air echoes with the sound of cannon fire, but neither of the men slow. When the city comes back into view, it is an ashy, smoldering disaster.

If cities had memories, Finn wonders if this would be familiar.

“We need to get out of here,” Poe shouts, just loud enough to be heard over another round of cannon fire. “I mean, out of the city, back out to sea.”

“Yeah?” Finn shouts back. “And how do you propose we do that?”

“Find the _Isis_!” Poe shouts back.

“Great,” Finn grumbles. “And assuming it’s not already been destroyed – and I’m assuming it has been – how exactly are we going to sneak past the _Finalizer_?”

Poe offers no reply. When Finn looks back at him, it’s to see the first signs of fear he’s ever seen etched out on the golden man’s face. He swallows hard, then turns away.

Thy duck into an alley as some of the faceless crew come storming past, their swords drawn but their faces void of emotion. Finn readjusts Poe’s hand in his and sticks his head out of the alley first, checking for more before they head back into the street.

“What are we going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Poe hisses. The air fills with the crack of cannon fire, and then, a shout. Both men wince. Cannon fire sounds again, faster, this time. Finn furrows his brow.

“That sounds like a second ship.”

“What?” Poe blinks at him as he starts to move again. Finn tugs him out of the alley, dragging him down one of Mos Eisley’s streets until the docks come into view. Both men come stumbling to a stop.

“Oh, holy shit.”

Another ship has appeared in the bay, its crimson flag just barely visible against the night sky. It is busy bombarding the _Finalizer_ with cannon fire, its sails drawn up as it circles its prey.

“Who the hell is that?” Poe shouts. Finn hushes him and drags him down behind a pile of rubble, praying that the faceless crew won’t look their way.

“Were you not paying attention when you went to your fancy naval academy?” Finn asks, shock keeping the bite out of his words. “Poe, that’s the _Libre_.”

He watches as _Libre_ ’s cannons roll out of their portholes and fire, blasting the _Finalizer_ with sparks and light. For the first time, Finn hears the men of the faceless crew start to scream.

His decision takes no time to make. “We need to get aboard that ship.”

“What?!”

“They’re our only hope for making it out of here alive,” Finn says. “If you’ve got Captain Vader’s mask, they’re sure to let us aboard.”

“How do you even know that?”

Finn blinks at his companion. “Do you really not know about that ship?”

Poe shakes his head.

“I’ll tell you about it later,” Finn says. “But right now, we need to go.” He hesitates, then reaches out and takes Poe’s hand again.

“You’ve really got to stop doing that,” Poe mutters as they start to run, but he doesn’t pull his hand away.

The docks of Mos Eisley have all but been destroyed, but there are remnants of driftwood laying askew everywhere. Finn scans them for a moment until one of the _Finalizer_ ’s longboats comes into view. He points it out to Poe, who then proceeds to lunge for it.

“So long as the _Finalizer’_ s guns are focused on _Libre_ , we should be okay,” Poe says, taking an oar in hand. Finn climbs into the boat after him and pushes a piece of shattered wood aside. He takes a smaller piece and uses it as an oar, assisting Poe as they push away from Mos Eisley’s burning shore.

Another round of cannon fire flies over their heads. Finn winces as he sees some of the townhouses take the damage, but does his best not to think about the few civilians who must remain. It’s not until some of the faceless crew slink out of the city that true panic starts to rise in his chest.

“Just stay calm,” he says, though he starts to row faster. “Just stay calm.”

“I am calm.”

“Don’t lie to me,” he says, looking back to Poe. “And I was talking to myself.”

Poe lifts an eyebrow, but doesn’t challenge him. Finn turns back against and sees some of the faceless crew raise their swords against them. He and Poe are far enough out into the water that it’ll take the crew some time to catch them, but he knows the strength of their loyalty. They will swim, if they think it’s necessary.

“How much further do we have to go?”

“Not so long now,” Poe says.

A cannonball splatters into the water nearby, and Finn finds himself swearing. “That’s from the swivel cannons.”

Another cannonball comes flying towards them. Finn hears Poe curse as it crashes just a few inches from the side of their boat.

“Can you swim?” the golden man shouts.

Finn looks over his shoulder. _Libre_ is still several meters away, but she’s close enough that he can see some of her crew looking their way. He waves to them, and is relieved to see someone wave back.

“I can swim far enough,” he says to Poe. Another cannonball cuts through the air.

“Good,” Poe says. “Then you’d better get ready.”

Finn glances towards the _Finalizer_ and sees the swivel guns turn their weigh. He looks back to Poe. “I’m ready when you are, navy boy.”

Poe laughs. The cannons fire. They dive.

As they hit the water, their longboat shatters into splinters, left to sink of the depths of Mos Eisley’s bay.

Finn’s head breaks water a few feet away from the decimated rowboat. He sees Poe, several feet ahead of him, and begins to give chase. The two men are panting by the time they reach _Libre_ , but they’re sheltered from any of the _Finalizer’_ s cannon fire.

“Throw down a rope!” Poe shouts. Finn looks up and sees one of the crewmen poke her head over the side. “Throw down a rope!”

For a moment, there is no response. Then, a feminine voice rings out: “Why should we?”

Another round of cannon fire echoes through the air.

“Because,” Poe says, wrestling with something on his belt. He lifts his satchel out of the water and waves it in the air above him. “I have the mask of Captain Vader!”


	10. Arc II, Chapter 03

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which goals run parallel - but do they intersect?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all! I'm doing my best to keep to my posting schedule, but sometimes time gets away from me. That said, I hope you're all taking care of yourselves in these trying times. Poe, Finn, and the rest of our cast of characters aren't, necessarily, but what good's a story without a little conflict?
> 
> I wish the best for all of you readers, though. XOXO

There is a moment of hesitation following Poe’s call. Then, a stern voice cuts through the air.

“Bring them aboard!”

A slew of orders follows, but Finn doesn’t bother to listen. A rope comes sailing over _Libre_ ’s port side. Poe is the first to grab it, and he hauls himself out of the water with an audible sigh of relief. Once he’s a body length up, Finn does the same.

They emerge on deck just as another round of cannon fire goes off. Finn hears shouting from the _Finalizer_ , but ignores that, too. The _Libre_ begins to shift beneath them; when Finn looks up, it’s to see her sails open in full. The bulk of the crew remains at their stations, manning swivel guns and full cannons alike, but two women break from the rest. One, a giantess, has her hands on her hips and has left one of her subordinates at the helm. A gash has opened up on the left side of her face, though from flying debris or sword, Finn can’t tell.

The other woman is significantly shorter than her counterpart, but fiercer. Her hair is tied back in three tight buns and she looks for all the world a scoundrel. She scowls down at Finn and Poe from _Libre_ ’s rigging, then lands on the deck in front of them. Her eyes are alight with what Finn assumes is the urge to run the both of them through.

“You have Captain Vader’s mask?” she asks, without introduction. Poe nods and produces the object. Finn narrows his eyes as he looks at it in person for the first time.

Kylo Ren’s satchel seems to have been made of sharkskin, because the mask emerges free of water. It is as black as the night around them and seems as though it would have covered the wearer’s entire face. There are only slits for the eyes, and even those are covered in some kind of gauze.

The shorter of the two women goes still for a long, long moment. The taller continues to shout, but Finn sees her rest a hand on the other woman’s shoulder.

“Get that _thing_ into my quarters,” the shorter woman orders. “We’ll make a tactical retreat. Once we’re out of range of these bastards, we’ll be able to have a longer conversation about how that came into your possession.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Finn nods. He hauls himself to his feet, then looks down to offer a hand to Poe. Poe takes it, gladly, and the two of them go running. They barricade themselves in the shorter woman’s quarters as another round of cannon fire goes screaming through the air.

“Who was that?” Poe demands, his back pressed against the cabin’s only door.

Finn doesn’t answer for a moment. His hands are shaking, as are his knees; he is soaked to the skin and exhausted. All the same, when he lifts his head to look at Poe, he finds himself smiling.

“That,” he says, “was Lady Kenobi. She’s captain here.”

“And the tall one?”

“Lady Phasma,” Finn says. “Her first mate.”

Poe huffs. “And why haven’t I heard of them before?”

“Because you weren’t meant to,” Finn says with a laugh. The adrenaline still pulsing in his veins makes him feel reckless; much of him wants to charge out of the captain’s quarters and rejoin the fray. “The crew of the _Libre_ is made up entirely of women. Most of them are runaways, though some are from fleeing marriages and others slavery. The only reason you haven’t heard of them is because so many crews think they’re not worth knowing.”

Poe frowns. “But you don’t think so.”

“No, I don’t.” Finn shakes his head. “Lady Kenobi and her crew are some of the most powerful pirates to sail these seas. They haven’t lost a single battle they’ve started, or so the rumors say.”

“So what would have brought her here?”

Finn chuckles. “Naval officers,” he says, rolling his eyes. When Poe goes to pull himself up, Finn apologizes. "She's here, I think,” he goes on to say. “Because she’s got one helluva a grudge against the First Order. Some folks say that Kylo Ren killed her family; others say that she’s never met him, but that she was in Mos Eisley when it burned to the ground and she never forgave him.”

Poe, still seemingly offended, leans back against the nearest cabin wall and brings a hand up to stroke his chin. “Is that so?” he murmurs, more to himself than Finn. “Well, then. Perhaps we’ll get along, after all.”

A final round of cannon fire sounds in the distance. Finn moves himself away from the cabin door and instead takes a seat on the floor, pressing his back against what he assumes to be Lady Kenobi’s desk. It’s then that the door to the cabin opens, and the woman herself comes storming inside. Her hair has loosened some, and her face is streaked with gun powder. She closes the door behind her and runs a hand over her face, which only serves to smear the gun powder more.

“Okay,” she says, without taking a step further inside. “You have five minutes to tell me how you came into possession of Captain Vader’s mask. If I find your story unsatisfactory, I will have you thrown overboard, devil take you both.”

Finn sees Poe raise an eyebrow. “Why the antagonism, good lady?” he asks, his voice going thick with charm. “From what I’ve been told, it seems our goals are one in the same.”

“You’re going to have to prove that,” Lady Kenobi says.

“Don’t worry,” Poe says with his trademark golden smile. “I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.”

Their conversation is a brief one. Lady Kenobi listens to Poe tell his story, then to Finn add his part. When both men have finished their tales, she sits in silence, staring blankly at the wall behind their heads.

“You served under Kylo Ren?” she asks, finally, turning her attention to Finn. He shakes his head and watches as the wrinkles in her brow grow deeper.

“How long were you aboard his ship?”

Finn hesitates, then shrugs. “Time goes a little funny aboard the _Finalizer_ ,” he says. “But I think it was for less than a year.”

Lady Kenobi hums and nods. “If it had been more, you’d likely not even have been able to guess,” she said. She moves past them, then, and reaches into the top drawer of her worn-down desk. Finn turns and sees her pull a journal from its shadowy confines. She holds it for a long moment, rubbing her thumb over its leathery cover.

“I’ve heard so many things over the years,” she says, though her voice is so soft that Finn doubts the words are for them. She looks up, a moment later, and sets the journal on the desk. “Is he really as bad as they say?”

Finn opens his mouth, but it’s Poe who answers. “Yes,” he nods. “Worse, I’d bet.”

Some new weight rests itself on Lady Kenobi’s shoulders, though Finn can’t fathom what it could be nor where it comes from. He frowns as she sighs.

“One day, when we’re further away from that – that _damned_ ship,” she says, “I’ll have quite the story to tell you. For now, though, let me do what I can do dispel one rumor.” Her mouth quirks into an amused smile. “My name isn’t actually Kenobi.”

Poe accepts this without blinking. Finn, however, leans forward. “Names are important,” he says, and sees Poe hide a grin. “What’s your name, Lady?”

The captain of the _Libre_ looks at him for a long moment, then looks back to the journal. “‘Kenobi’ is a name I borrowed,” she says. “But my first friends called me Rey.” The smile on her face fades, and her expression becomes dark. “But there’s no time to talk of that now. We need to find a place to hide away before the First Order can come after us again. I already had my share of enemies, but now it seems I’ll have Kylo Ren coming after my head.”

Finn can’t make sense of her expression, but for a second, it looks as though she’s amused again. Then, she pins the two men with a dark stare. “I hope you don’t expect to stay aboard my ship without doing any work.”

Poe and Finn exchange brief glances. Then, Finn laughs. “Lady Rey,” he says. “If I didn’t work, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself.”

Her smile, he thinks, as she beams at them, is a beautiful thing.

Finn finds the crew of the _Libre_ to be an agreeable sort. He sits among them during their celebratory dinner – for even half victories deserve celebration, according to Lady Rey – and drinks rum with the best of them, listening to their stories as night turns to morning. While he stays awake, Poe, he finds, disappears. The naval officer makes a home for himself in _Libre_ ’s lower decks and remains, upon Finn’s last check, fast asleep in one of the women’s hammocks.

“Like I was saying,” one of the women says, dragging Finn’s attention back to the present. “This bastard and his friend are coming at me, thinking I’m an easy target n’all. Then, Imogene comes barreling out of nowhere, her sabers _blazing_ , and they go squealing down the street like pigs on butcher’s day.”

The table bursts into laughter. A small woman with hair the size of a cannonball stands up proudly and takes a short bow – Finn assumes that she is the Imogene in question and applauds all the louder. Lady Rey laughs from the head of the table and raises her glass in the lady’s honor.

“Let it be known that anyone in trouble may call on our Imogene,” she says.

Another round of laughter takes the table. Finn grins at the captain, then takes stock of the women around him as he takes another swig of his rum.

Imogene is dark skinned and is perhaps the only crew member shorter than her captain; she is also, Finn notices, the only one not partaking in any rum. The woman who praised her appears to be named Bertha; she is a white woman with a strong Virginian accent and long, blonde hair that she keeps in braids. An Asian woman leaps across the table as a basket of biscuits goes passing by, a knife in her hand that she uses to stab her prey – this, Finn guesses, is Jessika Pava, immigrant turned pirate after a fall out with her fiancé.

The rest of the crew appears to him in flashes as the night progresses. He discovers that Vita and her companion, Virginia, are an eloped couple from England, but only after they proceed to kiss each other silly across the dining table. Vanessa, with her dark hair drawn back in cornrow braids, is the one who sends them away, offering them her bunk with a roll of her eyes. An older woman sits quietly in the back, sipping on her rum and watching them all. Finn doesn’t quite hear her name – Maggie, he thinks, or Magdalene, or maybe Maz – but the tint of her skin reminds him of Poe, as does the cleverness hidden behind her eyes.

He goes to bed when the sun rises in the morning, taking the bunk that Poe so kindly evacuates. They pass each other with murmured words of greeting, but neither is willing to look at the other. Finn opts not to think on this as he goes to sleep, but his gut feels uneasy and his mouth unclean.

When he wakes, it’s to find _Libre_ ’s crew quarters mostly empty, save for Vanessa, who is snoring in her bunk. He clambers out of his hammock and makes his way up onto the deck, where he finds Poe standing at the helm next to Phasma and her captain.

It’s midday, the sun beating down on the backs of the women running across the deck. The _Libre_ ’s sails are open in full, billowed out with the blessing of a good breeze. Finn takes the steps up to the top deck two at a time and catches the last of a conversation between Phasma and her captain.

“-without the mask, he’ll go running back to Snoke. He’ll likely want a war.”

“That’s hardly my problem. If he comes for the thing, I’ll tell him I dropped it in Kessel Reef. He can swim for it if he wants it back so badly.”

Finn hears Phasma snort. “That implies you’ll be talking with him. If he sees your face, we’ll have a whole different problem on our hands.”

One of the boards beneath his feet creaks. Both women turn, their conversation abruptly coming to a halt. Finn tries to smile at the both of them and finds himself failing. He glances over their shoulders – well, Rey’s shoulder – and finds Poe standing just behind them.

“Sleep well, friend?” Lady Rey asks, her tone deceptively light. “My apologies: our rabbles don’t usually go that late into the night, but it seems we were all feeling a little celebratory.”

“There’s no need for apologies,” Finn says with a smile. “I thank you again for being willing to take us aboard your ship.”

“Anything, so long as it vexes the First Order.” The humor in Lady Rey’s eyes makes Finn want to laugh, but there’s a sorrowful catch to the turn of her mouth.

“We’ve just been debating our next steps,” the lady continues, turning her attention back to Poe. “Your friend seems reluctant to give up the mask.”

“For good reason,” Poe says. “General Organa is already embroiled in a war; if the mask stays with me, you can stay out of the conflict.”

“Your chivalry, while flattering, is not needed,” Rey says. “It seems I have kept my nose out of trouble for too long. If I take the mask, much of your conflict can be avoided, and Kylo Ren can be further vexed.”

“And as appealing as that sounds,” Poe admits. “I’ve promised this mask to my General.”

Finn watches as the duo stares each other down. He sees Phasma settles herself behind her captain, arms crossed over her chest, and makes a snap decision. Poe spares him a surprised glance as he comes to stand at his side, but it last no longer than a second.

Silence reigns over the quarter deck. After several minutes, it is Poe who breaks.

“How about this,” he says, running a hand through his hair. “Finn and I need passage to Cloud City. I’ve already agreed to try and secure a pardon for him. If you take us there and speak with General Organa, I will ask _her_ to give you not only the mask but positions with the Royal Navy.”

Both Phasma and Rey snort. “We don’t want to be part of your navy,” Rey says.

“And your sorry ass hadn’t even heard of us,” Phasma adds. “Who’s to say that your General even knows we exist? There’s no bounty on our heads, nor any reason for her to come after us when her target is the First Order. You have nothing to bargain with except the mask, navy rat.”

“What does your General want with the mask, anyway?” Rey asks. “If it’s so important to her, why didn’t she come to seek it herself?”

Finn hears Poe sigh. “Things are different for a woman of her stature,” he says. “But the mask is vital to her attempt to dismantle the First Order.”

Rey is silent, clearly waiting, Finn thinks, for Poe to elaborate. The silence around them fills with the sound of her foot tapping against the hard wood of the deck.

Poe groans. “Look, it’s not my story to tell,” he says. “But obviously your goals are similar. If you come and talk to her, you’re going to have a chance at having the mask for yourself. You might even get to take Kylo Ren on in direct combat. Doesn’t that sound even the slightest bit appealing?”

Finn sees Rey’s stern expression falter. Over her shoulder, Phasma seems to go all the harder. He narrows his eyes and puts a hand on Poe’s arm. The man goes still beneath the touch, but doesn’t shove him away.

“Lady,” Finn says, careful to keep his voice soft. “There’s a story you’re not telling us, and we respect that. The General may have a story like that, too. Regardless of what happens or who you face in battle, don’t you think it’d be worth it to meet her?”

Rey stares at him for a long, heavy moment. “You know nothing about me,” she says, her voice soft as silk. She turns on her heels and storms down onto the main deck, silent save for the heaviness of her steps.

Poe sags beneath Finn’s hand. Finn pulls away and brushes his hand against his breeches, then looks up at Phasma. The tall woman seems tired and more than a little annoyed. She doesn’t say a word, simply turns away from the men and takes up her post at _Libre’_ s helm.

After some time, she speaks. “Dameron, up into the rigging. Finn, go wake Vanessa. She’ll find something for you to do.”

The men exchange a final glance, then snap weary salutes.


	11. Arc II, Chapter 04

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is dreaming.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all. I hope you're doing as well as you can. Have another chapter! I do deeply enjoy writing this piece; it cheers me up when I'm having a bad day, and all of your kind comments do, too. XOXO

The banality of life on a ship settles against Finn’s skin like a familiar coat. Vanessa drags him around the deck, first with a mop and bucket, then back and forth between different rigging mounts. Midday is long past when he catches sight of Poe again, sailing above his head as he bounces between the sails.

Rey reappears from her cabin just as the sun starts to tilt towards the horizon. She doesn’t look at him, nor does she speak to him. Instead, she takes Phasma’s place at the helm. What few words she speaks are shouted towards the crew. While it is clear to everyone that she is distressed, her voice remains kind. Finn expects to wince beneath her orders and instead finds himself leaning closer, the better to her what it is she wishes.

He wonders if this is the affect she has on everyone, or if it’s one made especially for her girls.

The sun is firmly settled in the western sky when he hears Poe call out from above. “Sail ho, captain!” the golden man shouts. Finn looks to Rey, who adjusts herself at the helm.

“What kind, sailor?”

For a moment, Poe says nothing. Then: “They’re not flying a flag, captain!”

To his surprise, Finn sees Rey perk up. Her grip tightens on the ship’s wheel, and for a moment, her eyes look bright. “Is it the _Finalizer_?”

There is excitement in her voice that makes Finn wonder, but there is little time to ponder it.

“No, captain!” Poe calls. “But it’s made of white wood; definitely the First Order.”

Rey visibly droops. Finn glances around and notices a series of concerned looks from her crew; this behavior, it seems, is new. It doesn’t take long, however, for the captain to right herself.

“Alright, mates!” she calls. “Ready the cannons! If the First Order wants a fight, I suppose we’ll have to give them one!”

A cheer goes up amongst the crew. Finn finds himself rooted to the deck while people fuss around him, moving from one side of the deck to the other with little regard for him. It takes a moment for him to rouse himself, but when he does, he notices that Rey is staring.

“Move, sailor!” she calls, looking directly at him. “We don’t have time to dally!”

“Aye aye, captain.” Finn snaps a salute and tries to look alert, running from the main deck to go and load the cannons.

He feels the ship turn beneath his feet and struggles, for a moment, to stay upright. The cannonballs are nothing in his hands, just false weight, and he passes them down a line of women with ease. It’s not until the side of the First Order’s sloop comes into view that he thinks about the enemy the _Libre_ is facing.

The white wood of Elijah Snoke’s fleet is well known throughout the New World, that of the _Finalizer_ being a stark difference. It takes Finn several moments of peering through the porthole to see the name that’s been painted onto this newcomer’s side, light as it is in water-thinned gold.

“The _Resurgent_ ,” he murmurs. “I’ve heard of you.”

“Have you?” It’s Imogene who interrupts his thoughts. “Then go up and talk to the captain, you ninny! We can use all the intel we can get.”

Finn goes scurrying at her command, his courage bolstered by her fierceness, though his heart still makes a game of pounding in his chest.

Rey doesn’t look surprised when he joins her at the helm, but she doesn’t pay him much mind. The sky is growing pink around them, and her eyes are fixed on the enemy’s ship.

“It’s the _Resurgent_ , captain,” Finn says, his breath coming in puffs. “It’s run by Captain Mitaka, one of Snoke’s underlings. He was barely made captain, last I heard of him.”

“An unexperienced man, I assume?”

“If my information is still sound,” Finn nods. “It’s less likely that he’s pursued you than he’s found you by accident.”

To his surprise, Rey laughs. “That’s just our luck, isn’t it?” she says, directing her gaze at Finn. The man stammers for a reply, but finds that he doesn’t have the time. The _Resurgent_ and _Libre_ creep closer to one another until Captain Mitaka comes into view. He leans over the side of his ship, a bullhorn in his hand.

“Lady Kenobi!” he shouts across the break. “Surrender your stowaways and any goods you’ve taken from the First Order, and your ship will be spared our wrath!”

It takes a concentrated effort for Finn not to roll his eyes; at his side, he hears Rey snort. “You must be new!” she shouts back. Finn winces; she has no need for a bullhorn. “I won’t be surrendering anyone or anything, so you might as well blow us to kingdom come!”

Finn sees surprise flash over Mitaka’s young face. He goes to lift his bullhorn once more, but hesitates, then drops it to his side.

Rey does not wait. “Fire all!”

The _Resurgent_ shakes as it receives the fullness of the _Libre_ ’s fire. Finn sees Mitaka fall onto the deck just before the deck of the _Resurgent_ is covered by smoke.

“Finn!” He hears Rey shout. “Back below deck with you! Tell the ladies to prepare to board!”

“Aye aye, captain!” Finn calls. He runs back below deck and, in a free moment, grabs a sword that one of the women has left near their hammock.

The _Resurgent_ crumbles faster than any self-respecting ship in Elijah Snoke’s navy should. Finn goes to board it with the rest of the _Libre_ ’s crew, but instead finds Rey at his shoulder, holding him back while she orders her ladies ahead. He looks at her, confused, and motions with his sword towards the waiting crew. Above his head, he hears Poe crow out a victory.

“Stay with me,” Rey says, her voice barely carrying over the noise. “I’ll need you in a little bit.”

Finn glances down and finds that her sword has not been drawn. After a long moment, he brings his sword down to his side. They stand together and watch as the crew of the _Resurgent_ falls to its knees.

It’s only after the bulk of the smoke has cleared that Rey goes to board the ship. She brings Finn along with her, walking arm in arm across a plank that one of her crew has thrown across the break between the ships. The crew of the _Resurgent_ has been tied to the ship’s mainmast with Mitaka in the front. Rey looks at him with a caustic eye, then turns her attention to her crew.

“Take everything they have,” she instructs. The crew cheers and disperses at once, scurrying over the ship like they own it. Finn watches them, then turns his attention back to Rey. Her sword remains undrawn, but he sees the hand that’s not hovering next to his curl into a fist. She unloops their arms and kneels so she’s at Mitaka’s level, careful to look the man in the eye.

“Captain Mitaka,” she says, her voice the same soft command as it was before. “Do you know who I am?”

The captain shuffles, then lobs a glob of spit at her feet. “Lady Kenobi,” he spits.

Rey hums, but doesn’t reply. She draws a dagger out of her boot and drags it across Mitaka’s jaw, her eyes distant as she shaves hairs from his face. The man, to his credit, does not whimper, simply stares ahead and awaits his fate.

“That’s not my name, actually,” Rey says, at last. Finn feels his breath catch in his chest and sees Mitaka blink, confused.

“Why should it matter to me what you go by?” he asks.

“Because,” Rey says, her gaze still far away. “The captain of the _Finalizer_ would greatly appreciate knowledge of where I am. I’m sure if you were to return to him with my real name, he would greatly reward you.”

Finn is not surprised to hear Mitaka snort. “You know little about Kylo Ren, lady,” he says. “He’s as likely to reward me for your name as kill me for returning defeated.”

“Yes, that seems like him,” Rey muses. “Before he kills you, though, you must do me a favor.”

Somewhere below deck, something explodes. The crew of the _Libre_ comes scurrying up from below, covered in gunpowder and carrying enough food to feed them all for a month. Finn finds himself fighting back a smile and nearly misses what Rey says next.

“Tell Kylo Ren that Rey sends her regards.”

A trickle of blood appears on the young captain’s cheek. Rey stands and tucks the dagger away, then reaches out to take Finn’s arm once more. She walks primly off the ship and back to the _Libre_ ’s helm, then waits for the rest of her crew to arrive.

“Cast off!” she calls. The _Resurgent_ is a mess of black, billowing smoke, but her voice remains clear. Grappling hook lines snap; someone grabs the plank and drags it back aboard the _Libre_ as the two ships break apart. Finn looks up and sees Poe comes flying over from the _Resurgent_ ’s rigging. The golden man catches the last of the dying sunlight and glows, and Finn feels his heart stutter in his chest.

Behind him, he hears a chuckle. Turning, he finds Phasma instead of Rey. Both women are looking at him from over the helm, though Phasma looks far more amused than her captain. Neither woman says a word, but Finn finds himself flushing, anyway.

He slinks back below deck as the _Resurgent_ fades into the distance. Despite his bloodless hands, more than one woman claps him on the back as they descend. Vita even presses a kiss to his cheek, though he sees Virginia shoot him a glare as the two of them walk away. Finn shakes his head and moves to settle in his hammock, every ounce of him heavy with the weight of the day.

He doesn’t realize he’s dozed off until someone shakes him awake. He opens his eyes and finds Poe standing over him, a plate of food in his hands.

“I don’t blame you for sleeping,” the golden man says with a smile. “But if you don’t move fast, you’re not going to eat tonight.”

Finn grumbles something that, were he more awake, could be called a complaint, but he lets Poe haul him out of his hammock, anyway.

*

When Finn wakes again, later that night, he’s back on the _Finalizer._ The ship is hazy, almost gray beneath his feet, and his breath catches in his throat like a sob. Finn sits up in his hammock and squints, trying to see the rest of the _Finalizer_ ’s faceless crew, but he is alone below deck. The stairs that lead above deck seem to shake, as though the ship is being attacked. When he bursts onto the main deck, however, the ship is alone in the open water. There is a trail of smoke coming from a spot on the horizon, but other than that, the night sky is clear.

From somewhere behind him, there comes a shout. Finn turns and cowers at the sight of Kylo Ren standing at the bow, his hand wrapped around Captain Mitaka’s throat. The man flails in the air, his hands clawing at Kylo Ren’s glove, until, at last, he falls still.

Kylo Ren does not hesitate to throw the man overboard. Finn hears his body hit the water and winces. His knees start shaking.

Kylo Ren does not turn away from the bow, nor does he seem to notice Finn’s arrival. As quietly as he can, Finn moves to sneak back below deck. He finds his way blocked, however, by the arrival of one William Hux.

Finn stumbles backwards, but Hux, too, does not see him. Finn goes to speak, but his voice catches in his throat; when he tries to move again, he finds that his feet have been welded to the ship’s deck. His heart is pounding in his chest, but he cannot move.

 _It’s happened_ , he thinks, as he watches Hux approach Kylo Ren. _I’m part of the ship. Part of the crew, part of the ship._

The mantra plays over and over in his mind, terrifying, numbing, as the first mate speaks to his captain. Finn doesn’t hear the words they say, but he watches as Hux, too, is lifted by the throat and brought to hang over the _Finalizer’_ s bow.

 _Part of the crew, part of the ship; part of the crew, part of the ship_ – “You told me she was dead!” – _part of the crew, part of the ship;_ \- blood, coughed up from Hux’s throat – _part of the crew –_ “And what are you going to do about it now?” – _part of the ship; part of the crew, part of the –_

“Finn!”

Finn gasps and opens his eyes. The salty air hits him at once, and suddenly, he can breathe. He falls and hits his knees on the _Libre_ ’s deck; Rey’s hands are small but warm on his shoulders as they shake him, trying to bring him back to the present.

“What happened?” he gasps, willing Kylo Ren’s screams out of his head.

“You’ve been sleep walking,” Rey tells him. Her voice sounds like it’s being muffled by several feet of water; she has to repeat herself several times before Finn understands her. He looks up at her and studies the clear lines of her face, counting her eyelashes until he comes back to himself.

“This happens to everyone who leaves the First Order; I’m surprised it didn’t happen to you sooner,” he hears her say. “When I left the _Finalizer_ , I dreamed of it for weeks. It’s alright, Finn; you’re not there anymore.”

Finn whimpers something that might be agreement and might be fear. He feels Rey’s hands tighten on his shoulders and does not resist as she draws him to her. He rests his head on her shoulder and steadies his breathing until the world rights itself in his mind.

“He’s killing people again,” he hears himself mutter. “He’s probably killed the whole crew.”

“What are you talking about?” Rey murmurs.

“Kylo Ren.” The name tastes like bile in his mouth. Finn coughs and tries to clear it away. “Whenever we’d done something – not even when we’d done something, really, whenever he was angry – he’d just…draw his sword and start swinging. So many people died, Rey. So many people.” He sobs and presses himself into the crook of her neck, his hands reaching up to grab her arms.

Rey whispers quiet nothings into his ear for what seems like ages, soft reassurances that Finn doesn’t hear and doesn’t quite believe, but at last he’s able to push himself off of her shoulder. There are tears trailing down his cheeks, he realizes, but there are also fresh tears on hers.

“You said you dreamed,” he says, once he finds his voice again. Rey blinks, surprised, then looks away. “You said you dreamed,” Finn says again. “What did you mean?”

Silence overtakes the night. Rey keeps her gaze firmly on the deck, though her grip on his shoulders tightens. Finn reaches up and brushes his fingers over her calloused knuckles. “Do you know Kylo Ren?” he asks, his voice soft. “Were you on that ship?”

He sees another tear roll down Rey’s cheek, but she does not speak.

Finn opens his mouth only to be interrupted by the sound of footsteps slamming against the stairs that lead below deck. He looks over and sees Poe emerge, his hair sleep tousled and his eyes wide with fright. He looks over and sees Rey and Finn, crouching on the deck together, and his shoulders sag. He comes and kneels before them, then reaches out with shaking hands.

“I thought you’d gone,” he says to Finn. His hand lingers in the air, then falls back to his side.

Finn lets out a wet chuckle then reaches up to wipes the tears away from his cheeks. “You can’t get rid of me that easily,” he teases. Poe chuckles, though it’s a desperate sound. Rey makes a noise that sounds amused, but still doesn’t look up. Finn sees Poe focus on her hands on his shoulders, then sees some of his relief fall away.

“Ah, sorry,” he says, suddenly awkward. “Did I – interrupt something?”

This, more than anything, snaps Rey out of her fog. “What?” Her hands fall from Finn’s shoulders like she’s been burned, though Finn glances at her and sees that she’s smiling. “Oh, please, Dameron. Your friend is lovely, but he’s not quite my type.”

He’s not sure what to make of the expression that overtakes Poe’s face, but it makes him laugh, all the same. He hears Rey laugh, too, as he starts to rise to his feet. It takes Poe a moment to do the same, and Rey a moment longer, but at last, they’re all standing.

The moment is only just verging on awkward when Poe clears his throat. “Well,” he says. “I’m going back to bed. I expect that we’ll have a long day tomorrow.”

Rey makes a noise that sounds like agreement. Finn watches Poe start to turn away, but something prevents him from following. Instead, he turns back to Rey.

“Will you take us to Cloud City, Lady?” he asks, his voice carrying through the night. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Poe go still.

Rey looks at him, her eyes still wet with tears. When she looks away, she casts her gaze out to sea, as though seeking something that neither she nor Finn can actually see.

“I’ll take you,” she says, at last. “But I want to talk to your General about that mask, navy rat. Do you understand me?”

Finn glances over and sees Poe’s shoulders shake with laughter. “Of course, captain,” he says, without turning around. “Thank you.”

Finn looks back in time to see Rey roll her eyes. “Thank you,” he says, as well, though his voice is softer than Poe’s. It is this, he thinks, that makes Rey look back at him.

“You’re welcome,” she says, likely to both of them, but mostly to Finn. “Now get to sleep. Dameron is right; we have a long trip ahead of us if we’re going to Cloud City.”

At last, Finn manages to smile. “Aye aye, captain,” he says. He goes to join Poe as the captain walks away and tentatively brushes his arm against the other man’s. Poe looks up at him through his thick lashes and grins, then nudges him in the side.

“Look at you,” he says. “Never would’ve thought you’d have been such a charmer.”

Finn huffs and quietly prays that the nighttime shadows hide his flush. “And here I thought you’d have more faith in me.” He’s teasing, but he’s not sure if Poe knows it. The other man huffs and takes a long step forward, descending the stairs faster than Finn cares to keep up.

Finn looks back, just before the night sky disappears from view. He counts the stars for a brief moment, then catches sight of Rey settling herself in the rigging. He stares for a moment longer, then returns himself to bed.

His sleep, for the rest of the night, is dreamless, though he still wakes feeling restless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you thought!


	12. Arc II, Chapter 05

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the pain begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, folks. I hope you're doing alright, hanging in there. This chapter marks the end of Arc II, which means there are some exciting things coming up in the future. Who knows? Maybe the rating will even go up... XOXO

The _Libre_ makes its way into Cloud City’s port two weeks after her encounter with the _Resurgent_. Finn is busy helping Virginia carry kegs of rum towards the galley when he hears Vita shout its appearance from the crow’s nest. The women on deck are quick to go about their duties, but more than one scrambles to the side of the ship, watching as the pink and gold city folds itself out of the cloudy grey sky.

“That’s Cloud City?” Finn asks, coming above deck to go and stand at Rey’s side.

“How should I know?” the captain says with a shrug. “It’s your navy rat who told us where to go.”

“You’ve never been to Cloud City before?”

Rey turns and pins him with the full weight of her unimpressed stare. “You haven’t, either.”

Finn hesitates, then shrugs. “Fair point.” He waits until she’s settled back at the wheel before continuing. “Seems like something only a really ballsy pirate would do, anyway.”

He doesn’t turn around, desperate to hide his smirk, but he hears the Lady Rey snort. There’s no warning before her hand comes flying to smack him in the back of the head, but it’s a nothing blow, barely more than a pat. Finn laughs as he dances away.

“You snarky bastard,” Rey says, though she can’t hide the way she’s grinning. “You’ve just insulted yourself, too, you know.”

Finn offers her a shrug and a smile, then leans back against the _Libre_ ’s railing, watching as the speck of land in the distance gradually grows larger.

Several ships come out to meet them as they move closer, but none of them move to attack. Finn relays Rey’s order to send Poe and Phasma to the front of the ship, leaving them leaning out over the bow to shout at the oncoming ships.

“They’re friendly!” he hears Poe shout. “They’re here by General Organa’s request!”

Finn tries not to wince and sees Rey do the same. Poe may do his best to get him a pardon, and Rey may be spared the rope by her anonymity, but until they meet the general, nothing’s guaranteed.

All the same, the rumors spread by talkative sailors will likely give them something of a leg up once they arrive in port. Finn bites his lip and wonders if Poe Dameron is a cleverer man than he seems.

“Is he always like this?” he hears Rey ask.

“I wouldn’t know,” Finn replies. “But somehow, I think he is.”

Rey snorts, and Finn grins all the wider.

The _Libre_ is escorted into port by a fleet of smaller boats, all of them full of men armed to the teeth with long scrolls of paper and inked feathers stuck into their fanciful caps. Vita is pulled back from the side of the ship by a jealous Virginia after she whistles at one too many, but Imogene has no one to restrain her. The pirate crew receives a hero’s welcome that leaves spirits high – save for Rey, Finn, and Phasma, who are reduced to babysitting the _Libre_ ’s over-enthusiastic crew.

Only the threat of royal steel keeps the citizens of Cloud City from boarding the pirate ship after her gang plank drops. Finn cringes away from the large crowd and looks to Rey for guidance.

“Half of you, remain aboard!” she’s shouting. “I don’t care how you divide yourselves, just do it quickly.” Then, she looks to Finn. He sees a mask fall into place, but there’s a flicker of kindness just behind her eyes. “Take my arm,” she says. Finn doesn’t hesitate; he does as he’s told. The two of them walk towards the gang plank together. Phasma joins them on Rey’s right side, then Poe on Finn’s left.

“You ready for this?” Finn hears Poe mutter.

He musters a grim smile. “Are you?”

As they descend into the crowd, the cacophony becomes overwhelming. The citizens of Cloud City are shouting for Poe, for the ship, but not for Finn; he goes noticed but unnamed as they walk off of the docks. Rey keeps her head facing forward, he notices, and smiles at no one. After several moments of looking through the crowd, Finn resolves to do the same.

Poe does the showboating for the both of them, waving to everyone as though they're long-lost family, promising interviews to the few men who make themselves heard over the curious roar of the crowd.

“Where exactly is your general?” he hears Rey grumble as they shoulder past the masses.

“Up there,” Poe says with a nod. The structure he indicates seems part palace, part fort, and it towers over the rest of Cloud City, pink and crimson in the sunlight. The marble staircase leading up to it is surrounded on both sides by throngs of people, and if Finn squints, she can see a regal figure standing at the top.

Rey sighs. Finn gulps.

The crew that’s descended with them disperses as they move closer to the structure, disappearing into the city on missions Finn is not privy to. By the time they reach the base of the winding staircase, only he, Poe, and Phasma remain alongside the captain. Rey glances back at them and nods approvingly before beginning her ascent.

She is stopped at once by a pair of royal guards.

“Excuse me,” Finn hears her say. “We have an audience with General Organa. I do hope you won’t mind letting us through.” The mocking in her tone is light but clear, and Finn sees both of the guards shift their grips on their weapons. It’s not until Poe moves forward that either of them step aside.

The walk upwards is slow. A gentle mist settles over the city, blotting the streets and port from view until all Finn can see if the shine of the too-blue sea and the crest of the palace in front of him. Poe does not seem to get winded, but Finn’s sides begin to ache only halfway up. He sees Rey start to struggle, as well, but she hides it, wiping sweat from her brow and flicking it aside. He throws her a sympathetic grimace when she looks back his way and receives a half-hearted smile in return.

They do their best to pull themselves together by the time they reach the top of the staircase, but the worry lines around Rey’s eyes tells Finn that it’s not enough. Another array of guards steps forward to prevent them moving forward, but he catches a glimpse of someone cloaked in purples just a few meters behind them.

Poe, seizing his opportunity, steps forward before any of the guards can speak. “I have returned from my mission, good general,” he calls over their heads. “I would like to request an audience so I can give a full report.”

There is smug laughter from inside the array. “I’m not so sure it should be granted,” a light voice says. “It seems my afternoon has already been taken up. I have a meeting, it seems, with a wanted criminal.”

“Oh, please.” Finn smiles at the confident disdain in Rey’s voice. “You didn’t know I existed until a few hours ago. I don’t even have a bounty.”

“Not in this city, perhaps,” the general says. “But you made quite a name for yourself when you sacked Exar Kun, didn’t you?”

There is a chuckle from the guards. Finn blinks, then ducks his head to hide a smile. Stories about Exar Kun were shared with the crew when he first boarded – all part of the Lady Kenobi façade he knows Rey wears, but at the time, the Lady had been painted something of a demon, running through the city and slaying First Order agents and Royal Guards alike.

“To be fair,” Rey says. “I was being attacked from all sides. I didn’t know you were keeping up with me.”

“Then you underestimate me.”

The guards move aside, at last, and reveal a short woman dressed in light greys, save for her purple cloak. Her greying hair is pulled into two buns on either side of her head, and while her eyes are lined with wrinkles, her smile speaks to mischief. “I wouldn’t be a damn good general if I didn’t know the pirates who threatened my men.”

Finn fights back a bashful grin, and out of the corner of his eye he sees Rey do the same. He bows to the general a moment later and watches her expression twitch through his lashes.

“Oh, there’s no need for that,” she insists, but Finn sees Poe offer him a subtle thumbs up. Rey bows, a moment later, but it takes a nudge to the side for Phasma to so much as nod her head.

“Your man and I struck a deal, not too long ago,” Rey says as she rises. “Upon delivering him and his friend to your port unharmed, we were supposed to come into possession of a certain package of yours.” She pauses, and Finn sees her give the general a brief once over. “It seems we’ve come to want the same thing.”

The general shakes her head and sighs. “Been making promises without consulting me again, Lieutenant?” she asks, chiding Poe from around Rey’s shoulders. “Bing Lee told me I’d only need to deliver a pardon. It’s far more to ask that I give up our…package, especially after you put so much work into retrieving it.”

“With respect, General,” Poe says, stepping forward. “The package would not be here were it not for Lady Kenobi’s assistance.”

“Oh, I’m sure you would’ve found a way.” The general returns her attention to Rey with an exasperated sigh. “It seems we have much to discuss. You’ll be spared any harassment from my men so long as you remain in Cloud City, but the package my lieutenant has retrieved is extremely precious to me.”

“I, too, have a use for it,” Rey says through gritted teeth. Finn sees her hands curl into fists and takes a hesitant step in her direction.

“Tell her why,” he murmurs, though it’s clear that the general still hears him. At her bemused expression, he clears his throat. “It’s better than having a pissing contest in the middle of the hall.”

To his surprise, the general laughs. “What’s your name, son?”

“Finn.” At Poe’s nod, Finn holds out his hand. The general doesn’t hesitate to shake it. “I served on the _Finalizer_ with your lieutenant.”

The general’s grip doesn’t slacken, but something in her face goes hard as she pulls away. “You served on the _Finalizer_? I’m surprised you made it off the ship.”

“I owe quite a debt to your lieutenant,” Finn says. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Poe shuffle. Something of a pinkness appears on his cheeks, but Finn writes it off as evening sunlight. When he looks back to the general, it’s to see her hide a smile.

“Then perhaps I can’t be so upset with him,” she says. Then she returns her attention to Rey. The pirate captain hasn’t uncurled her fists, despite Finn’s gentle words. Finn sees her glance towards the general’s array of guards as though she expects them to run her through. The General follows her glance and clears her throat.

“At ease, the lot of you,” she says, shooing them off with a wave of her hand. “I’ll start screaming if something goes wrong.”

The elite guard exchange a series of what Finn thinks are exasperated glances, but they do eventually depart. The general waits until they’re out of the room before returning her full attention to the party.

“Why don’t you start from the beginning?” she says, moving to brush a stray hair out of her face. “Your stories sound complicated, and I haven’t got all day to talk to each of you.”

Finn catches the nervous glance Rey exchanges with Poe, but all the lieutenant does is shrug. They exchange glances, as well, as do Rey and Phasma, but no one moves to question the general. At last, Rey lets out a sigh.

“Okay. This is how it goes.”

*

In the end, Finn almost regrets being present for Rey’s tell-all. Her voice, when she’s finished, is ragged from overuse, and her gaze is fixed firmly on the general’s polished marble floor. Poe, Finn can tell, is shocked, but he does his best to hide it. Phasma merely looks bored. She picks at her fingernails while Rey staggers to a close as though she’s heard this all before and never once looks her captain’s way – somehow, though, Finn thinks Rey doesn’t mind.

To her credit, the general doesn’t give Rey her pity. Finn recognizes the sympathy that passes through Leia’s gaze – and that’s who she is, this softer, broken woman: Leia Organa, not the general – but he doesn’t comment on it. He doesn’t say a word, simply reaches out and lets his hand rest on Rey’s shaking shoulder.

“Thank you for telling me this,” she says, her voice measured and kind. Finn thinks he sees a tear run down Rey’s face, but he looks away before he can be sure. Instead, he fixes his gaze on Poe. The lieutenant is slow to pick his jaw up off of the floor, but seems to come back to himself once he feels Finn’s gaze on him.

“So you mean to say,” he says, stepping forward. “That you sailed with that – that _monster_ – for months and didn’t realize what kind of effect running away would have?”

Rey’s gaze snaps away from Leia and lands coldly on Poe. “He was a different man then,” she says. “There was hope for him then.”

“I’m sure.” Poe grimaces. He lets his jacket slide from his shoulders, pulls his shirt over his head, and when Finn can look away from the defined muscles of his back, he sees the scars the cat-o-nine tails left on the lieutenant’s skin. “But I don’t think I can bring myself to hold the same hope for him now.”

Leia’s eyes have gone wide and her face, pale. Rey’s glare has only grown fiercer.

“I didn’t know!” she snaps, reaching down to pick up Poe’s jacket. “I didn’t have a clue what kind of man he’d become. Even if I had, can you really blame me for getting off of that ship?!”

“He was bad before, Rey,” Poe says – he sneers, but he takes the jacket from her with unbiased hands and wads it into a ball. “You said it yourself: he wanted to rule the world. He didn’t care who he used or who he killed in order to meet that goal, and he certainly doesn’t care now.”

“That’s enough!” Leia snaps. The sound goes out of the room in a moment, and all parties fall still. Finn realizes that he’s migrated over to Poe’s side, while Phasma looks tense behind Rey. Her sword is halfway out at her side, but a stern look from Leia sends it sliding back into its scabbard.

“Lieutenant Dameron, Finn, Phasma,” the general says. “You are dismissed from my chambers. My guard will see you to your sleeping quarters in the palace, should you wish to claim them. If not, there are more than enough suitable inns in this town for you to spend your time in.”

There is no disdain in her voice, only stern, unbending steel. Poe drops his head at once, but Finn doesn’t hear him apologize. He looks to Rey for a long moment before storming out of the general’s quarters.

Finn, however, lingers. With a cautious look at the general, he moves forward and claps Rey on the shoulder once again. She doesn’t look at him, but he feels her sag beneath his touch. “I’ll talk to him,” he hears himself say. “Take care of yourself. Yeah?”

It takes her a long moment to respond, but eventually, Rey nods. Finn squeezes her shoulder one last time, then lets his hand drop and moves away.

He doesn’t hear what Phasma says to her captain, nor what Leia says to the girl. Instead, he focuses on the bouncing head of black curls in front of him and does his best to keep up.

Poe doesn’t follow the guard who are waiting outside Leia’s quarters. Instead, he makes his way past them and onto a balcony that overlooks the city. Finn lingers a few paces behind him, watching and worrying his hands together as his friend bows his head. Poe leans against the balcony’s railing and swears, brings his fist down on the cool stone, then lets his body sag.

Finn hesitates. He does not move forward. He waits.

After what feels like hours, Poe lifts his head.

“Come on, Finn,” he says without turning around. “You’re missing one helluva view.”

Finn’s footsteps makes too much noise as he walks across the balcony, but he forces himself not to listen to them. He settles down beside Poe and stares over a thousand rooftops, all of them shining in the day’s dying light.

Beside him, Poe shifts. The inches between them seem like miles.

“Have you ever seen anything like this before?” Poe asks.

“I haven’t.” Not during the daytime, at least, and never from this height. Finn watches as the roofs of the city change from brown to gold, then to yellow, then to pink and red. The water of the bay shines, and for a moment, he has to look away.

He finds himself staring at Poe, who is, in turn, encased in sunlight.

“What a shame,” Poe says, shaking his head. “If we have any free time over the next couple of days, I’ll have to take you on a tour.”

Despite the man’s temper, Finn finds himself smiling. “How long have you lived here?”

“Just the past couple years,” Poe says with a shrug. “Long enough for all the sparkle to wear off, but that doesn’t mean I love her any less.”

A golden man in a golden city. How fitting, Finn decides, as he shuffles his feet.

“What can you remember now?” Poe asks.

The question cuts through the air and leaves Finn faltering. “What?”

“What can you remember?” Poe repeats. “About your past. Has anything…come back?”

Finn huffs and turns away from the golden man. He bites his lip and tastes blood, though its more salt than iron.

At last, he speaks. “There was a man. I don’t know if he was my brother, my father, my cousin – I don’t know if he was family, but he was damn important. I remember following him through life, helping him, though never expecting any help in return.”

He sees Poe’s brow furrow. “But he was your family?”

“Aye.” Finn licks the blood from his lips. “I’ve heard of similar things – men who swear their lives to other men. Perhaps it was something like that.”

Poe hums, but does not reply.

“After he died – thrown into the water,” Finn continues, “I was brought to one of the islands just inside of the New World. They sold me for good money to a tobacco farmer. I suppose,” he chuckles, though there is no heart in it. “I suppose I should be proud of that.

“That is all I have,” he continues. His hands curl into fists at his side, but he breathes out and forces them open. “I don’t know how I got away, when I joined that ship…it comes back more slowly than I would like.”

“Nothing to be done about that, buddy,” Poe says, after a beat. “All that we can do anymore is wait.”

Finn nods and grits his teeth. The two men stand in silence, watching as the sun settles down atop the water.

“What happens now?” Finn asks, at last.

Poe sighs. “The fleet is not large,” he admits. “But if the rumors are true, Lady Rey has more than enough friends to make up for what we lack. If she calls them in, it’s possible that Cloud City will go to war.”

“Against Snoke.”

“Against Snoke.” Poe nods. “And against Kylo Ren.” He laughs, but it’s not a happy thing. “I just want it to be over,” he says, running a hand through his hair. “This not-war, nonsensical sort of thing – my father would’ve hated it.”

Finn blinks, surprised. “And your mother?”

Poe snorts. “My mother was part of the general’s early guard,” he says. “Even after Captain Vader had died, Leia needed protecting. My mother made sure she stayed out of trouble – at least, trouble with any enemies of hers.”

“She does seem like an active woman,” Finn admits.

“There’s little keeping the general still,” Poe agrees. “Though it was worse back in the day, or so my mother said. There are still a few days when I envy her.”

Finn doesn’t bother to fight back his chuckle. “You want to see more action?”

“I want to get things done.” Despite his levity, the words come out hard. Finn’s smile fades as Poe frowns, staring out across the water with a fierce, stubborn glare.

Their arms brush. Finn holds his breath.

The men don’t move for some time. They watch, quiet, as the fog rolls away from Cloud City and the streets open. They see Phasma, pacing on the palace’s staircase. They see a mob of people still standing at the docks; they see lights flickering on, a sign that the crew of the _Libre_ is still aboard, defending her with their lives. Only once the sun has set does Poe stand up straight, and does Finn go to follow.

“You know,” Poe says, his voice rough but soft, all the same. “If I ask, the general could put you on the same ship as me. When we go to leave, I mean.”

“You mean when we go to war,” Finn replies. He considers the offer for a time, watching as the peaches and pinks of the city fade into blues. Then, he sighs. “I’m a pirate, Poe. Piracy is the only sort of freedom I have.”

“But it doesn’t have to be that way.” Poe keeps his tone light, but Finn sees lines of pain make appearances around his eyes. “With your pardon, you’ll be able to do whatever you want.”

“Hardly.” Finn’s laugh is hard. He reaches out and takes Poe’s hand in his. The golden skin shines against his own. “Look hard, sailor,” he says, his voice no more than a whisper. “I want to sail with you. I would follow you to the ends of the earth, if I could. You’re my friend, Poe.” His voice breaks. “But no matter how open minded the general is, and no matter what kind of men your naval officers are, I am this. That will not change, and people will only ever see me as such.”

Poe’s hand comes and closes around Finn’s. His skin is warm and worn from years spent at sea. “Consider it,” he says, and he’s not quite begging, but Finn knows a plea when he sees it. As much as it pains him, he draws his hand away.

“I will sail with _Libre_ ,” he says. “After our battles are over, I will come and find you. But I cannot sail with you.”

He turns his back to Poe’s quiet plea and starts for the marble staircase. He hears his name once, twice, and then – silence.

Finn takes the steps slowly and keeps his breath steady, resisting the urge to fall apart.

**End Arc II**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you thought! Thank you so much to the returning reviewers; I may not talk back often, but I see you, and I appreciate your comments more than I can say <3


	13. Arc III, Chapter 01: Kylo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It only gets worse from here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Early posting! I'll be away from wifi for the Thanksgiving holiday, so the next update may come a little behind schedule. In order to make up for that, have a chapter early. XOXO.

**Arc III**

A sloop slips in to Cloud City’s port under the cover of darkness. Its sails and wood are inky black, but there is no name etched into its side. The men who crew it are few. Many, upon closer inspection, are without their tongues as well as their faces. They will wait, unquestioningly, for their captain, and any misdeeds committed by them or him will never be told of – unless the captain wants them to be.

At the moment, he does not.

Kylo Ren has snuck into Cloud City before, and finds himself more than capable of doing it again. The mask he dons is not the one the captain of the _Finalizer_ is known to wear; it is a simpler thing, only covering his nose and mouth. The hat he wears is widely brimmed and drawn low over his eyes. He makes eye contact with no one as he walks through the streets and disappears into back alleys, where identity is less important than what a man has to give.

His gifts are many. Pressed into the right hands, they earn him this: General Organa has taken up with the captain of the _Libre_ and is, if the rumors are true, housing her in the royal quarters. Kylo thanks his informer with a bag full of gold and a sword through the stomach. Then, he makes his way up towards the palace.

There are passages he learned of as a boy, made known to him on one of the few occasions his father had attempted to bond with him. He takes to one now, finding its entrance covered with moss in the back of a seedy inn. The trip underground is less than pleasant, but it is better, he assumes, than being escorted inside by the guards.

When he emerges, he is a stain amongst the polished marbles of the palace. He keeps his head low and sticks to the shadows until, at last, his mother’s gilded doors come into view.

Kylo draws an unsteady breath. His hand ghosts over the door handle once, twice, but then sticks, and he is inside.

His mother’s chambers are large, though her guest rooms are located closer to the bay than her own. He slips past the doors he once knew as a child and catches a glimpse of a mark left by a knife, a notch of one inch buried into the wall. He swallows hard and continues walking without looking back. There is no sign of his mother’s guard, but that does not mean he has time to linger.

His breath catches when he sees which room his mother has granted her pirate guest. If the doors to her chambers are familiar, the doors to Rey’s are intimate. Kylo slammed those doors many times when he was still Ben; barricaded himself inside and screamed, shook, cried, though he no longer wishes to admit it. It pains him to push those doors open, to step over that threshold, but he does. He does because it is the necessary thing to do.

His heart stops not two steps into the room.

Rey’s hair is spread out on the pillow (his pillow). Her face is soft in sleep, but he can see new scars gently caressing her cheeks. Her lips are chapped and bitten; there are a thousand freckles on her nose that are just barely visible in the moonlight; her fingers, where they curl around her blanket (his blanket), are small but strong.

Foremost, though, she is alive, and Kylo is barely strong enough to stay on his feet. The noise that leaves his throat sounds like a sob, and he’s at her bedside in a moment, down on his knees with one gloved hand hovering above that precious head.

It takes him too long to realize that the pirate captain – Lady Kenobi – _Rey_ – is not truly asleep. Between one blink and the next, her eyes are wide open and there is a dagger pressed to his chest.

“Rey.” It leaves him like a gasp. She narrows her eyes, and his heart breaks. “Rey.”

“What’re you doing here?” Her voice is soft but unmulled by sleep. The part of his brain that is not utterly distracted by her and not preoccupied with her dagger at his chest wonders if she was ever asleep at all.

It takes him a moment to pull himself back together.

“One of my captains gave me some interesting information,” he says, at last, his voice too light. “The Lady Kenobi who’s been plaguing the First Order seems not to be who she said she was.” His hand twitches, just above her head, and he reaches, brushing some of her loose hair out of her face. She does not shy away from his touch, and for a moment, he is elated.

Then, some of his good will fades. “You’ve been attacking my ships, Rey.”

“You’ve had men chasing me, Kylo,” Lady Kenobi replies. “You’ve been burning down cities and hurting innocents, Kylo. You’ve been trying to tear the world apart, _Kylo._ ” His name leaves her tongue like a hot coal, falling flat on the floor between them and burning. He tries not to wince when she says it, but he doesn’t know if he manages.

“I thought you were dead,” he says. “My men – they told me you were dead.”

The dagger digs into the cloth on his chest. Rey shuffles, and some of the blanket covering her falls away as she sits upright. “You know what I’ve heard?” she hisses. “They told me you hung Ben from the yardarm. They told me you destroyed Mos Eisley. They told me you’re a _monster_.”

Kylo grabs the hand that holds the dagger and pushes it closer to his chest. The metal, when it touches skin, is cool. “Is that why you’ve been running from me?” he asks, tightening his grip. “Is that why you left in the first place?”

The old anger, hot and rancid, stirs in his stomach and moves up to his throat. If Rey is alive, then his father – then Han Solo hadn’t lied; she’d ran away from him. Kylo watches her face for a sign of remorse and sees something like a flicker. Her grip on the dagger lessens, but his only grows stronger.

“That’s not why I left,” Rey says, and her voice is soft. She looks away, as though the headboard behind her bed is more interesting then him.

“Then why?!” Kylo demands. “I woke to a cold bed and found you gone. I have thought you dead for _years_. Tell me why you left me, Rey; we’ll see if it’s a good excuse.”

This brings her gaze back to him, cold and burning. “I left because you wanted what I did not,” she says. “‘We could rule the world, Rey’ – like that’s what I wanted. I told you when you found me that first time; all I ever wanted, Kylo, was my freedom. Men like Snoke have nothing for me. Neither do men like Captain Vader.”

She tugs, and Kylo’s grip on her dagger breaks. The blade tears through the fabric of his shirt and leaves it hanging.

The room falls silent save for the sounds of her soft panting. Kylo feels a headache building behind his skull but tries to will it away.

“Get out,” Rey says, her voice soft. “I’ll have to deal with you soon enough.” She sets her dagger back on the nightstand and pulls the silken sheets of the bed around her as though to ward off a ghost or some cold breeze.

Kylo doesn’t move. After a moment’s hesitation, he rises from his crouch and sits on the side of the bed that was once his. He sees Rey tense as he reaches into his pocket, but he does not try to appease her. Instead, he pulls out a thin scrap of white fabric and presses it into her hand.

“Do you remember when you came to me?” Kylo says, his voice no more than a murmur. “You were dressed in all white: pristine, even though you’d spent days in the brig. I hadn’t seen anyone so beautiful in my entire life, and then, some god decides to throw you in my lap? Makes you a part of my crew?” He strokes the fabric, then takes Rey’s hand in his own. It’s only at Rey’s scowl that he removes his glove.

When his skin touches hers, the world catches fire.

“I loved you,” he says, reverent. “I still do. Don’t make me go to war with you.”

The huff that leaves her mouth is a precious thing, despite its sadness. “I’m not the one making you go to war with me, Kylo,” she says, tracing her thin fingers over the callouses of his hand. “Please. Just go.”

The wound stings, but it does not kill him. He has one more chance, he reasons, as he takes the fabric out of her hand. Kylo tucks the piece of fabric back into his pocket, leans forward, and kisses her.

She does not resist him. The whimper she gives him is better than any word she has ever said; he tucks it away into the corner of his memory as he leans in further. She gives herself to him, brings her arms around his neck, and they go tumbling back onto the bed of his youth. He towers over her, he always as, but now it’s precious, as though he can curl her up and tuck her inside of him, keep her safe from Snoke and the whole wide world.

Her lips are soft, and by some miracle, she doesn’t push him away. Kylo only breaks when he needs a gasp of air, and even then he leaves his forehead pressed against hers. He brushes a strand of hair from her face and kisses her forehead, then her lips again, then her collarbone, the white of her nightgown making her soft where he knows she’s not.

“Please, Rey,” he begs, kissing her again. “Give back the mask. Come home.”

He hears her laugh, but it’s a broken thing. Her grip on his shirt is tight; he doesn’t resist her as she pulls him back and presses her mouth to his. She tastes like fire and ash, and he lets himself burn. When she pulls away, he is breathless; he leans back in to take her, only to have her hand come between them.

“I will give you this,” she says, gesturing out towards the room. “But only this, Kylo, do you understand?”

In the depths of his heart, he does. More pleas rest on his lips, but there is a look in her eye that he has seen before; it is final, and it is true. So much of him wants to stand up and leave at that look; he nearly does, but her hand catches his collar and brings him back to her.

He relents. “Okay.” He kisses her again. “Only this.”

“Only this,” Rey whispers, kissing his brow.

It has been several years since he’s touched anyone in a way that could be called gentle. He lets her guide him down, pressing his chest against hers enough so he can feel her skin, flushed against his, but not so much that he crushes her. Their lips move slowly, tentative, unfamiliar, and it aches as much as it soothes.

Kylo sighs as Rey tugs on his bottom lip. She weaves her hands through his waves of hair and tugs, a touch too hard. Kylo growls, but it’s a threatless thing; he rolls over when she pushes, letting her straddle him as she rises, her knees settling on either side of his hips. He’s hard, achingly so – only natural, really; she’s the only woman he ever let himself touch, and there hasn’t been anybody since –

He thinks he sees her smile in the dark, but he dismisses it as a trick of the shadows. She leans back down and kisses his brow, his nose, then his mouth, all the while letting her hands roam the planes of his stomach, ghosting over the fabric of his dark shirt.

With an impatient huff, she wriggles it off of him and throws it to the side. Kylo nearly laughs, but then she’s pressing down against him, and the sound turns desperate as he slides his tongue against her lips.

They fall apart in pieces. Kylo buries his face in Rey’s hair as she strips him off his pants; he only moves to prop himself up, giving her enough room to shimmy out of her shift. Her skin is hot against his, and her thighs are strong as they wrap around his waist. He traces new scars across her chest, her hips, feels the callouses on her feet and hands, and she watches him, patiently kissing his temple as he lavishes her wounds.

“They’re old, now,” she says, breathy as he mouths his way down to her breasts. “There’s nothing you could’ve done, anyway.”

“You’re wrong,” he growls and feels her shiver. “I would tear the men who hurt you to pieces if I could.”

He thinks he hears her chuckle, thinks he feels her sigh, but then his mouth is on one of her perk, red nipples and she’s gasping, writhing beneath him, her slick sex rubbing against his cock.

The effort it takes not to come is staggering, but Kylo focuses on the feel of her bud between his lips and holds off. He waits until she’s dripping, staining his old sheets, before sliding into her, and even then he sees her wince. She catches his worried expression and seems to fight back a laugh.

“There’s not been anyone since you,” she says, adjusting herself on his cock.

The sound Kylo makes is a broken one, and then he’s kissing her again. His thumb migrates down to the top of her cleft, rubbing against her click as she rides him. His name is a chant on her tongue, a spell, and prayer; something trails down his cheek, warm and wet, and he realizes that he’s crying. He buries himself in kissing her, too ashamed to pull away, but one set of tears joins another.

She comes with her mouth pressed against his and her eyes screwed shut. Her mouth falls open, her hands curl against his chest, and he holds her as she quivers, hanging on with the tightest grip until he, too, falls over the edge. He collapses back on the bed, pulling her down with him, and stares up at the ceiling, listening to his heartbeat as it pounds in his ears.

Even once his breath has slowed, he refuses to move. Rey slips from him and curls herself against his side, her naked warmth a blessing even in the humid ocean air. Kylo turns and cards a hand through her damp hair, then presses a kiss to her forehead.

“I love you,” he murmurs as she closes her eyes. She makes a noise that sounds affirmative and curls closer, then kisses the breadth of his bare chest.

Kylo watches her as she falls asleep and is almost happy.

*

He slips away before morning comes, mask and hat back in the place. One of his gloves is missing, but he trusts Rey to tuck it away before anyone who’d know it could see it. He slinks in the shadows of the docks until his little sloop comes into view, her crowd already busy preparing for him to set sail.

They didn’t expect to stay so late, he imagines, but at least he can trust them to refrain from asking questions.

The first mate is waiting for him when he goes to board. They walk together, silent, until the gangplank has been lifted from the docks and the anchor has been raised. Then, the first mate presses a thin roll of paper into Kylo Ren’s hand.

He unrolls it without a word and reads. His jaw tightens.

“We’re being summoned to Malachor,” he tells the first mate. “Make your way to the helm. Get us out of the bay before sunrise; I want to be back aboard the _Finalizer_ before the day is out.”

The first mate snaps a brief salute, then does as his captain bids. Kylo watches him go, then turns back to the note. A moment later, he crumbles it in his hand.

He spares a glance backward for Cloud City’s spiraling towers, for the palace his mother lives in. Something white and fluttering is standing on a balcony high above him; he imagines it’s Rey and raises his gloved hand. The figure lingers for a moment longer, then turns away.

He doesn’t see the figure in purple watching from a higher tower. He turns his back on the city and fixes his eyes on the horizon. His eyes are hard, his hands ball into fists, but his heart aches – he knows that when he next returns to this city, it will not be so pleasant a visit.

The thought of the city in flames digs into his chest like a knife, but Kylo Ren ignores it. He’s long gotten used to pain.

*

Malachor Bay, it is said, consists of more wood than it does water. The skeletons of ships stick out at odd angles, leaving a figurehead or two to stare out, sightless, at any ship that dares enter. Navigation is a tedious thing, but the crew of the _Finalizer_ are a well-practiced lot. General Hux, twitchy and impatient, manages to lead them through the labyrinth in just under three hours.

“My fastest time yet,” he announces to the shadow at his side. Kylo hums, but does not reply. The gangplank is set, and he is the first to descend, leaving the rest of the faceless crew behind with Hux to instruct them.

He makes his way up to the stony expanse of cliff wall that faces out towards the sea and takes a moment to locate the steps painstakingly carved into its side. Kylo takes them two at a time, a shadow on shadows, until the world is silent save for the sea and the sound of his own breathing.

What lies at the top of the cliff is not a temple, precisely, nor is it a castle. It is a mammoth, a construct of broken stones lying jagged atop one another until they look like a thorny crown; a caricature of some sharp-topped mountain. The door that leads inside is not a door at all, but rather a gaping hole filled with nothing but darkness.

Kylo takes a long, steadying breath before he steps inside. The air around him, once crisp and clean, becomes thick with incense. There are soft groans coming at him from all sides, but he ignores them, his steps carrying him only deeper into the den.

When the candles are unlit, the center of the not-temple is pitch black, save for a sliver of light that breaks through a crack in the ceiling. At the center, on a barren throne of glass and stone, sits Elijah Snoke. His head, once covered in a mane of red hair, is bald, and the scars running down both sides of his face speak to battles won in ages past. His skin has grown pale and grey in the darkness, or so Kylo supposes – he has yet to see the man in broad daylight, so his appearance is reduced to shadowy approximations.      

He sits, now, on his throne, while a legion of women and men lay on the floor around. Some are bowing, their heads drawn to their chests in concave submission. Others lay prostrate, corpse-like. Others still are writhing in ecstasy, a lover’s head between their legs or their bodies pulsing together, their pleasure a sacrifice to their god.

Snoke looks on past all of this, uncaring, to his captain, his right hand, his servant – to Kylo Ren.

“What reports do you bring me from Cloud City?” he asks. His voice does not shake the darkened chamber; it is quiet, almost unheard over the sounds of worship in the room.

Kylo winces, but tries to disguise it with a bow. “The rumors are true: General Organa has fallen in with the Lady Kenobi. My sources inform me that Lady Kenobi’s allies will be joining them in the city shortly.”

“And what of your grandfather’s mask?” Snoke asks. “After so much work went in to obtaining it, have you managed to retrieve it?”

Kylo swallows. Looks away. “I did not.” The tastes of his pleas are bitter on his tongue, but he bears them and waits for his punishment to come.

He glances upward and finds that Snoke has fallen still. “It seems your failure with the naval spy has cost us dearly. You seem speckled with failure of late, Kylo Ren. Even your attempts to redeem yourself have proven…unhelpful.”

“Go from me,” he continues, his voice echoing through the den. “There is little time to waste. Lead my fleet to Tibanna Bay. If you are unable to reclaim your grandfather’s mask through diplomacy, then I shall recover it by force. Your mother’s putrid resistance will burn eventually, Kylo Ren; it is up to you to decide when I will set light to her pyre.” The smile on his face is far from kind. “Think on your sins, Knight. Pray they do not come back to haunt you.”

Kylo finds himself choking on a particularly thick cloud of incense and is forced to close his eyes. When he opens them again, Snoke is gone, and the audience chamber has gone silent. Only the broken throne remains, cast in a pale grey light.

Kylo stares at it for a long moment, then turns and exits the hall.

 Hux is waiting for him on the coast, his back to Snoke’s holy temple. His bottom lip is bleeding, but no worse than usual. Kylo comes and stands at his side, casting his gaze out across the sea.

For a moment, there is silence.

“Well?” Hux says. “What errand are we running next?”

“We’re going to Cloud City ahead of the fleet,” Kylo replies. “They’ll be following just behind.”

“How far behind?” Hux sniffs. “Half a day, a full day, or a week? I’m disinclined to let my ship sink into the waters of some backwater bay.”

“It’s not _your_ ship,” Kylo snaps. “And half a day, at most.” He hesitates. “Snoke will be joining us, a few days in.”

Hux goes still. He reaches for something no longer in his pockets, then curses. His teeth, Kylo notices, are stained with a touch of brown.

Kylo doesn’t linger. He moves forward, towards the longboat he’d dragged ashore, his feet sinking in the soft sand.

“Did you find what you were looking for, Ren?” he hears Hux call. “In Cloud City? You know, the last time you went?”

It’s not as smug as he knows Hux wants it to be, but it stings, nonetheless. Kylo keeps his gaze forward as he clambers into the boat.

Each stroke against the ocean tide makes his biceps burn, but he figures it’s good exercise. Before long there’s nothing in his head; no Hux, no Snoke, just the sound of the ocean waves.

Kylo glances over the side of the longboat.

He’d considered drowning himself, once. The water is not so deep as it is elsewhere, here, and he’s not inclined to leave his bones in Malachor’s bay, but he’s thought about it. He reaches down and skims his fingers over the water. It’s cold, bitingly so, and he’s quick to pull away.

He focuses his mind on the _Finalizer_ and returns to his rowing.

Day passes, and night falls. The _Finalizer_ cuts through the water with a speed Kylo can’t process. He stands at her helm for hours, staring at the horizon and watching as the towns along the shoreline flicker to life. Cloud City is several days’ journey from Malachor, so there is time, he reasons. Time to send messages, time to compose himself –

Time to rest and dream of Rey’s smile.

It is not her smile he dreams of, though, but that of his mother’s. When he sleeps, he sees Leia, bent over at her desk as she waits for word from him, years and years ago. He sees his father – he sees Han Solo flicker in and out of view, frequently, at first, but gradually less so.

He sees Rey in her silken white robe sitting at his mother’s feet like a child.

“Tell me what’s happened,” his mother orders, but her hands are soft as they weave through Rey’s long hair.

Rey does not speak. Kylo watches her from the shadows, unblinking and still. She leans into his mother’s touch, though he knows she’d never admit it.

“Snoke is moving against us,” she says, at last. “He’s bringing his fleet to Cloud City and intends to destroy it, should we not meet his demands.”

“Of course,” Leia snorts. “No originally. I didn’t even think it of him.”

Kylo muffles a snort in the darkness, but neither woman can hear him. He wonders why he’s not offended.

“We’ll fortify what we have, then,” Leia says with a sigh. “Can your friends make it here in a reasonable time?”

“Barring any attacks from Snoke’s men, we should be fine.”

“If your informant,” – the word is heavy on Leia’s tongue – “was able to get here in such short time, I’m assuming we won’t have long.”

Rey shuffles and, more a moment, looks guilty. “Tell me what you need me to do,” she says, schooling herself, and Kylo is flushed with pride. “I will see it done.”

Leia looks at her for a long moment. Then, she reaches out and takes Rey’s hand in hers. “I wish we could have met under different circumstances, my dear,” she says.

Kylo sees Rey bite her lip, sees her squeeze his mother’s hand. “Believe me,” she says. “So do I.”

The dream falters, skitters, then turns to black nothing. Kylo drifts, aimless, only to wake in the morning and begin the day anew.

Life aboard a ship, pirate or otherwise, is tedious. Kylo finds that he longs for dreams. He wears himself to death pacing across the _Finalizer_ ’s broad deck, shouting orders until his voice is hoarse and his face in numb. Then, he retreats and falls asleep once more.

Healthy? Perhaps not. His stomach aches for lack of food and his throat is parched, but Kylo feels no need to attend to such things. He simply wakes, works, then sleeps again, all for a desperate glimpse of Rey, or his mother, or anyone.

Two days out from Cloud City, Snoke joins his crew, coming aboard with the assistance of a bleached white sloop. After this, Kylo doesn’t sleep at all.

**End Arc III**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *laughs softly, head in hands* I made Kylo Ren crying during sex; that's not even a headcanon of mine.
> 
> Let me know what you thought! XOXO


	14. Arc IV: Until We Meet Below

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which it ends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> READ ME, PLEASE. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE.
> 
> Hello, kids. Let's talk about trigger warnings and spoilers.
> 
> TW: graphic descriptions of violence and injury, character deaths, implications of suicide. If any of these things bother you, either proceed with caution or let chapter thirteen be the end to this strange and wild adventure.
> 
> Thanks for sticking with me. You'll notice that I've added another chapter to our long-standing count. I'll explain the reasons for that in the final note.
> 
> XOXO

Rey’s arms ache from the weight of the newly delivered cannonballs she's hauled onto the _Libre'_ s busy deck. She sets her latest crate aside and wipes sweat from her brow, looking down onto Cloud City's dock as the sun climbs higher above her head. The city beyond the port is bustling, tense like a smoking sailor near a powder keg. It’s been like this for the past two weeks – since Kylo Ren had snuck his way in and out of the palace walls; since Rey spent a night with her head on Leia’s lap, watching the sun rise.

Somewhere high above, she hears Vita shout: "Sail ho!"

Rey rushes up to the main deck and joins Phasma at the helm, squinting out at the horizon, towards the dot she cannot see.

“Are you sure?” she calls back.

“I’m sure, captain!” Vita shouts. “Not sure if it’s one of theirs or one of ours, but I figure it’s best to be cautious.”

Rey cannot help but agree. “Send someone up to tell the General,” she instructs, then rushes to the docks, ready to bring another round of cannonballs aboard. There are still several crates waiting on the deck; Poe and his men had the courtesy to drop them off, but none of the Royal Navy’s finest were able to stay behind and help bring them aboard. Rey huffs and blows a strand of hair out of her face. The weight isn't too much for her slim frame to bear, but it stretches her, makes her waddle as she carries the crate below deck.

When she makes her way out of the dark hull again, it’s to find Phasma doing her work for her. Her first mate has an entire crate of cannon balls held in her hands and is lugging them onto the ship without so much as breaking a sweat.

Rey stares for a moment, then shakes her head and chuckles. “Imogene, Finn!” she shouts. “Go and bring the rest of those crates up!"

“Aye, aye, captain!”

Rey watches as Imogene and Finn trip after one another, wincing as Finn's unsteady feet getting the best of him. He takes one of the crates in hand and stumbles as he makes his way back up the gangplank, but Imogene catches him, one strong arm bracing his back. Rey warms when she sees him smile, but she does not let her gaze linger.

“Any more news on that sail, Vita?” she shouts, making her way back towards the helm.

“It’s still just out of range, captain,” Vita shouts back. “Though it looks like there are a couple more just behind it.”

“Maybe those are just clouds,” Rey mutters. She moves to the bowsprit of the ship and stares out at the horizon, then slips her own spyglass out from the inside of her coat. The specks on the horizon widen, though only a little, as she brings it up to her eye.

It doesn’t take long for her to confirm Vita’s findings. Just behind the first boat – a large thing, white wood and white sails, and oh, the irony – are several smaller specks, hardly distinguishable from the skyline. Rey swears and sets her spyglass aside.

“They’re not ours.” Finn’s presence at her side makes her jump. Rey swears again as she looks at him, her heart hammering in her chest. He remains steady and cool, for a moment as faceless as the men she once sailed with.

“How can you know?” she asks, fear making her spit.

Finn looks at her not with impatience, but with a heavy wait borne on his too-small shoulders. “It’s a feeling,” he says, looking back at the horizon. “A bad feeling. And anyway: a faceless pirate always knows his own.”

Rey scowls. “I was a part of that crew, too, you know.”

“And that’s why you sent for the general.” Finn looks at her again. “Don’t lie to yourself, Rey.”

For a moment, she wants to hit him. There is an ache in her heart like a knife blade, and she wants to ignore him, to defend her allies as though they really were her own, but she can’t. He’s right. She knows.

“Get the rest of the cannonballs on board,” she orders. Finn does not linger, quick to do as she says.

Rey opens up her spyglass again and returns her gaze to the sea. After another moment’s hesitation, she turns away.

“Alright, little lambs,” she snarls, storming her way back down to the main deck. “It looks as though the wolves are coming to our door. Perhaps we should show them the teeth that we’ve stolen along the way?”

The answering cry of her crew is more than enthusiastic, and it warms the parts of her heart that are not freezing over. Rey musters a smile as she falls into line, helping haul the crates that remain on the docks down into the hold.

She spends a moment in the shadows, just remembering how to breathe, before joining her crew once more.

*

General Organa boards the _Libre_ shortly after noon, accompanied by her naval captains and the best of her guard. Poe stands among them and smiles when Rey sees him, but neither of them exchange a word. Rey watches, instead, as the General paces the deck before settling herself in front of the  _Libre'_ s main mast. Her captains flank her, forcing the lady pirates to scurry on around them. Rey swallows the urge to spit at them and watches the General, instead. The General's eyes follow the women as they play with one another; her gaze grows distant with some strange sort of longing.

“What are you standing around for?” Rey hears Imogene swear. “Do you just want to wait until the damned bastards arrive?”

“Shut up, Ima,” Rey calls, breaking the moment. “The General wouldn’t be here if she didn’t have something to say.”

The nostalgia fades from Leia’s eyes as she smiles, wicked, old, and wise. “Indeed. It is more a question than a request that I bring to you, Lady Rey, though it is something I hope you’ll consider carefully.”

“Oh?”

“You are pirates,” Leia says. She folds her hands behind her back, the picture of patience. “Do pirates not resist sailing under anyone else’s command but their own?”

There’s an affirmative murmur from the crew, but Rey herself does not speak. She glances back and sees Finn coming to stand at her side, wiping sweat and sawdust off of his brow. He does not look at Poe, nor does Poe look at him.

Rey turns her gaze back to the General. “That is typically how this operation works, yes.”

“So I suppose it would be foolhardy to ask you to sail under me? Even for the day?”

The question comes as no surprise. The presence of Leia’s captains doesn’t ensure Rey’s positive response, but Leia knew her advantage in bringing them, and at placing Poe amongst their number. Rey resists the urge to roll her eyes. Instead, she crosses her arms, pretending to consider the notion.

“I’m not sure how well my ladies will take to someone who’s not me ordering them around,” she says.

“You would still be in command of your crew.” It is strange that, even with a threat bearing down on them, Leia seems willing to play this game. “I simply ask that you sail in companionship with my men, and that if I order your attack – or your retreat – you listen to my commands.”

The act of consideration does not slip, but Rey sees some of Leia’s captains grow restless. Poe remains serene among them, and it makes her hateful – though only a little.

“I can’t promise that I’ll listen without complaint,” she says, at last. “Nor can I promise that if I see Snoke, I’ll wait for your command to lop off his head.” Another murmur runs through her crew. “But I will not sail without you, and I will do my best to listen to what you have to say.”

“I suppose that is all I can ask for.” Not quite the answer she wanted, then, but Rey sees Leia fight back a fond smile. “I look forward to embarking on this adventure with you, Lady Rey.”

“I wouldn’t say I’m looking forward to it,” Rey drawls. “But I do suppose I’m glad to have you and your men at my side.”

Leia does not bother to hide her laugh. “Wait for my flagship to set sail before you do, at least?” she asks.

“Aye, I can agree to that.”

“Thank you.”

They do not part ways with shoulder pats or hugs, but the General and Rey consider each other across the worn wooden deck of the _Libre_. The words of thanks are still pressing themselves against Rey’s chapped lips when Leia goes to turn away. She sees the older woman hesitate, a step faltering, and has to resist the urge to chase after her.

Leia leaves the deck of the _Libre_ unimpeded. Her captains follow her, slowly, until only one remains.

Rey smiles once more at the lingering Poe. Something in her heart relaxes when he does the same.

“Good to see you again, officer.”

“And you, lady.” Poe offers her a short bow. “Is your ship nearly prepared for battle?”

“As prepared as we can be,” Rey admits. She sees Finn stiffen out of the corner of her eye and does not allow herself to sigh. “Which ship will be so lucky as to have you on it?”

“The _Black Hawk_ , lady,” Poe says. He does not look at Finn. “We’re to be three ships down from yours on your starboard side.”

“I shall look for you when we depart, then,” Rey says. As Poe goes to turn, she speaks again. “Be safe.”

Poe’s laughter shines bright, though it is gilded, not gold. “Why, lady,” he says, throwing her a wink. “It sounds like you almost care.”

“Oh, believe me, I don’t,” Rey says, crossing her arms. “But it’d be a shame for the navy to lose such a fine officer.”

The wrinkles that have appeared around Poe’s eyes grow soft. “You flatter me,” he says. “Be safe yourself, lady. The sea could use more pirates like yourself.”

Rey laughs, a sharp, crow-like thing. “Get off my ship, Dameron,” she says. The golden man bows again, then does as she requests.

Rey is still smiling when she turns back to Finn, but the sight of his face makes her happiness facture. She watches him watch Poe depart, his eyes following the man’s figure until he must be out of sight. She does not turn around, does not look to the docks, but rather stands shoulder to shoulder with Finn, her own gaze cast out to the sea.

“You’re a fool for not going with him while you had the chance,” she tells him, voice soft.

“Am I?” Finn asks. It sounds like a genuine question.

“You are,” Rey insists. “One night and one long day would have been better than never seeing him again.”

Finn lets out the saddest of sighs. “I’m sure you’re right, captain,” he says. Their shoulders brush as he turns; Rey winces as he pulls away. “Is there anything else you’d like me to do before we make way?”

Rey hesitates, then lets the deflection go. “You’re free to do as you please,” she says. “But if you’re not on the ship when the call goes up, I will not hesitate to leave you behind.”

“You’re a cruel captain, lady,” Finn says, his mouth full of teasing. “Don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere.”

Rey knocks their shoulders together again, then sends him on his way. She watches as he goes to head below deck, then sees Phasma come to walk at his side. “That’s what I’m worried about,” she murmurs, though her voice is lost to the wind.

She resists the urge to chase after Dameron herself and turns, taking to the rigging to join Vita in the crow’s nest. Her crew mate seems surprised to see her, but Rey doesn’t mind. She bids the woman go and takes up her post, using her spyglass to stare out across the open sea.

Black sails have joined the white. Rey grimaces, but does not set her spyglass aside. She searches for the familiar flag – Captain Vader’s skull against two cutlasses – but she does not find it. Kylo is either hiding, then, or not present at all.

“Where are you?” she asks, her voice catching in the wind. “Come on, love. I haven’t got all day.”

*

The General’s ship leaves port less than an hour later. Rey starts in the crow’s nest at the sound of trumpets, then watches as Cloud City’s pride and joy, the _Alderaan_ , casts off and takes to the water. The sound of cheers reach her deck, and she spots one or two of her own raise their hats in farewell. The ship, white wooded and golden sailed, raises its rebel flag, and the cheers grow even louder.

“Well?” she calls down to her waiting crew. “Should we raise up one of our own?”

The General had left a flag for them to use; orange wings on white fabric. Rey sees Maz holding it awkwardly in her hands, then grins as the woman casts it aside.

“Raise up our own,” she croaks. “We don’t need a navy flag.”

The crew crows their ascent. Rey rolls her eyes as she descends from the crow’s nest to take a familiar swath of black fabric in her hand.

“Prepare to cast off!” she bellows, sending her crew scurrying. The anchor is raised with unusual vigor, and she sees Phasma strut to the helm, her head held high. Rey fixes the flag to its pulleys herself. Rope in hand, she waits until Phasma calls the cast to raise it up high.

The _Libre_ joins the _Alderaan_ in Cloud City’s bay flying the Jolly Roger, black and blistered against _Alderaan_ ’s white. The cheers for her crew are not as loud as they were for the pride of the Navy, but Rey swears they are twice as wild.

Vita, back in the crow’s nest, is the first to break her from her revelry. “I count nine ships, captain,” she calls. “No familiar flags in sight.”

“I can’t say I’m surprised,” Rey murmurs. “Who would have thought those boys would lack for pride?”

Laughter carries through her crew and keeps their spirits high. Rey does her best to keep smiling as she makes her way down to the main deck to take her place at Phasma’s side.

Her first mate is quiet as Rey settles in. She keeps her gaze locked on the horizon. Rey glances at her once, then once again, and finds her words stuck to the back of her throat.

It is Phasma who speaks first.

“Do you remember,” she says, “when we were in Mandalore? How you got captured by a bunch of locals and I had to come and keep you from becoming some cannibal’s favorite meal?”

The memory makes Rey’s nose wrinkle. “They used far too much spice on their food,” she says. “It took me ages to scrub the paprika off my skin.”

“You looked like you had a bad sunburn for weeks,” Phasma snorts. The _Libre_ plows through a wave that sputters over the bow. Rey looks up and hears her pirates cheer as the water dances through the air.

She breathes in deep through her nose and lets the salt burn the back of her throat. “Are we ready for this?” she asks, her eyes trained on the horizon.

Phasma takes a moment before replying. “I think I am,” she says. “And I think you are, too.”

Rey does not answer. Without moving her gaze from the horizon line, she reaches out and rests a hand lightly on the ship’s wheel. After a moment’s hesitation, she feels Phasma’s calloused one overtake her own.

“Yeah,” she says, almost to herself. “There’s nothing else we can do.”

***

Finn counts each minute as he watches the enemy ships draw closer. His breath is steady and deep in his lungs, and his stance is firm, but his hands are shaking at his sides. He watches as the General’s ship draws closer to Snoke’s – and he knows it’s Snoke’s – and feels his heart start to stutter in his chest.

The fleet, he knows, has joined in behind them, but he has not look back to count the ships. He has not looked back at all. His eyes are set on the faceless crew; his brothers, once, though he never knew their names. He watches as the two flagships run parallel and hopes, for one long, desperate moment, that it won’t come to battle.

Then, for the first time ever, he hears Snoke speak.

“General Organa.” His voice is supernaturally loud; it threatens to send ripples through the water around their hulls. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Snoke,” Finn hears Leia scoff; her own voice is amplified, though Finn doubts she needs the help. “I wish I could say the same.”

There is an echo of deep laughter – no, not an echo, a suggestion of it, as if the world had birthed the noise but none of them could remember hearing it. Finn feels goosebumps rise up on his skin, though the air around him remains balmy and warm.

“My demand is simple, General,” Snoke says. “Give me the mask of Captain Vader, and this massacre can be put off for another day.”

Finn cannot see it, but he gets the impression that Leia shrugs. “Tempting,” he hears her admit. “But I’m not the one in possession of the mask.”

For a moment, there is silence. Then: “Ah. Of course. It’s with the lady pirate, isn’t it?”

There is an audible gasp from the deck of the _Alderaan_. Finn watches as Rey shifts at the helm, pulling a small spyglass out of the lapel of her jacket. Across the water, something shifts on the deck of the enemy’s flagship.

Elijah Snoke appears over the forecastle of his ship, grey and white and faceless – many faced, an impossible thing. He seems to suck the color out of the air around him, and for a moment, there is nothing at the helm of the ship except white, empty space.

Finn sees Rey wince, but she does not look away.

“He’s not human,” he hears Vanessa whisper, somewhere nearby. “That’s impossible; he can’t be human.”

Across the water, Finn thinks he sees Snoke smile.

“Lady Rey,” he says (there’s nothing helping his voice carry over the water, Finn notes, though there is little left about the man that could surprise him now). “I didn’t think I’d ever have the pleasure of meeting you face to face.”

Rey hesitates, then sets her spyglass aside. Finn hears her clear her throat. “I don’t think I can say the same,” she bellows. It’s a mockery of itself, this shouted politeness, and the crew of the  _Libre_ is quick to laugh. None of them see the twitch of Snoke’s lips.

“Let us keep this brief, shall we?” he calls. “Give me the mask of Captain Vader, and we’ll spare this fine city for another day.”

Rey seems to decide that there is no point in acting; where her face would usually be drawn up in amusement, her smile now is cold. “Phasma,” she says, still loud enough to be heard. “Bring the mask out of my quarters, won’t you?”

The first mate does as she is told. When she vanishes, Finn sees something new shift on the deck of the flagship. A shadow pulls away from the wheel and comes to position itself at Snoke’s side. Finn doesn’t need a spyglass to know that this is Kylo Ren.

Rey doesn’t, either. Finn sees her breath stop, then watches as she pulls herself back together. Nothing in her expression changes.

Phasma returns, the black bag carrying Captain Vader’s mask in hand. She passes it to Rey with a meaningful look, then takes her place at _Libre_ ’s helm once more.

Rey does not hesitate. She reaches into the bag and pulls out the mask, holding it high in her right hand. The bag is left to fall to the side.

“Do you mean this mask?” she calls.

Snoke does not move, but his shadow does. “I do, indeed,” Snoke purrs. “Would you like me to send a longboat over to retrieve it?”

 _Now,_ Finn thinks, she looks like she’s considering. When Rey brings her empty hand up to stroke her chin, it hits Finn like a brick. He knows what she’s planning.

“No, I don’t think that will be necessary,” he hears her say. Then, without so much as a blink, Rey steps over to the side of her ship and drops the mask into the water. “You can swim for it, if you want it so badly.”

The sea itself seems to go silent. Finn looks from his captain to the flagship and thinks, for a moment, that Snoke looks shocked. He’s quick, though, to hide it.

“That was a mistake, child,” the old god says. Then, he turns away.

No one hears him order his cannons to fire. The world, already so drained in his presence, becomes a mass of black smoke.

The men aboard Leia’s ship are prepared, however. The moment Rey starts shouting orders, they are returning fire, blowing holes in the side of Snoke’s flagship. Finn does not have time to look back and assess the damage. Rey orders him below to man the cannons, along with several others. The _Libre_ begins trudging forward, her bow cutting through the ocean’s waves. The rest of the naval ships follow suit, quick to defend their General.

“That was mad, Rey!” Finn hears Phasma shout, even above the cannon fire. He does not hear Rey reply.

There is no making sense of a battle from below deck. Finn reminds himself not to think about what’s going on outside; all that matters is loading the cannons. When the first glimpses of ship wood come into view, he freezes. When Maz orders, he fires. Then he reloads his cannon.

It is repetition, it is familiar, and it steadies his fluttering heartbeat. He does not see the path that the _Libre_ takes, but he sees the destruction they leave in their wake. He runs from port to starboard unabashedly, bracing whenever the ship rocks with a round of enemy fire.

“We’re approaching Snoke!” Maz shouts. “Give him hell, ladies!” She catches Finn’s eye as he runs for another cannon ball and, strangely, throws him a wink. “You, too, Finn!”

Despite everything, Finn finds himself fighting a laugh.

He takes to the starboard side of the ship and loads another cannon. The white-brown of Snoke’s ship is just coming into view, and it is burning. The fire is a relief against the drained wood, sharp enough to hurt his eyes. He does his best not to look away and waits for Maz to order him to fire.

The order never comes. Cannon balls come barreling through the side of the ship, knocking him flat on his back and shooting through the bulk of the stairs. Maz goes tumbling, but Finn doesn’t see to where. When he looks up again, it’s to find Vanessa standing in her place, her face smeared with gunpowder.

“Back on your feet!” she shouts – Finn does not imagine the way her voice quivers. “They’re not going to beat us!”

Finn takes a moment, shudders, then does as he’s told.

***

Kylo Ren is bleeding.

There is a gash in his side from a piece of railing that splintered when one of his mother’s cannon balls went crashing through it. His lip is torn open. There is a cut over his eye; his blood constantly obscures the vision. Still, he remains a statue, standing above the steps that lead below deck, commanding the best of the faceless crew to fire, over and over.

His mother’s ship is in flames. Much of her crew has abandoned ship; she has likely taken a longboat to another ship, herself. Snoke has decimated her, and seems intent on doing the same to the rest of the Royal Navy.

Kylo wipes the blood out of his eye again and orders the crew to fire. The _Libre_ is just barely out of range, but he doesn’t care; if he doesn’t catch them, he’ll catch somebody in the crossfire. It doesn’t matter who, so long as someone burns.

He can still see it: Rey, bright and burning in the sun, dropping the black of his grandfather’s mask into the ocean. Pride, shock, and rage had roared to life in him all at once; only Snoke’s order to _move_ had brought him shakily back to life.

He doesn’t know why he felt proud. He doesn’t care. He orders the crew to fire.

The _Libre_ comes into range; Snoke’s flagship rocks beneath him. Kylo sees Rey running across her deck while the rest of her crew stands ready at their swivel guns. A cannon ball rockets past his head. He does not move. He doesn’t care.

He orders his crew to fire.

The _Libre_ ’s side caves, and he hears Rey scream. What remains of his heart shatters. He doesn’t care.

Then, Snoke is at his ear. “Board her,” he orders, before disappearing again. Kylo Ren doesn’t know where he goes, if he bleeds, what he’s doing while the rest of them stand and burn. He doesn’t care.

“Grappling hooks!” he bellows, and the faceless crew does as they’re commanded. Hooks shoot out from the side of the ship and wrap around the _Libre_ ’s railing; just as quickly, they are cut away.

“Again!”

Rey does not move quickly enough, this time; two of the ten grappling hooks stay their marks. Kylo feels blood start to drip into his teeth and wipes it off of his face.

The steady wind above blows his hair into his face, into his blood, but it brings the ships parallel.

“Prepare to board!”

He hears Rey shriek and is overcome, for a moment, by the urge to laugh. His men – no, _Snoke’s men_ – throw down makeshift bridges for boarding that clatter as they land on the _Libre_ ’s deck.

Kylo’s next order turns into a choke as the women of the _Libre_ come charging onto his ship. It takes him several seconds to think to draw his sword, and by that time, the women have already engaged the bulk of the faceless crew.

Rey is not among them. Phasma, however, comes for his head. She is just as much of a giant as he remembers; Kylo barely manages to parry a blow from her cutlass and goes stumbling backwards for his effort, tripping over a piece of mast that has fallen to the deck. He scrambles out of the way of her second, cursing as he shouts for his men to fight back.

“Don’t worry about them, meat,” Phasma snarls. Her next blow hits home, digging into his shoulder. Kylo does not scream. He does not care. He switches his sword from one hand to the other and prepares to go again.

Phasma smiles.

Then, there is a shout. Both Kylo and Phasma look over to see Rey, her sword held to Elijah Snoke’s throat.

“Yield!”

The word echoes through the air and brings silence with it. The sound of metal on metal, the sound of cannons, the sound of his own breathing – it all disappears.

Kylo Ren sees Snoke smile. “No.”

His sword pierces Rey’s gut in the same moment she takes off his head. Kylo Ren hears her scream.

Then, his world goes black.

***

Cloud City’s bustling port is dark when her ships return. Those who once stood, waiting for their heroes to come home, have been driven inside by a steady fall of rain. The few who remain are soaked to the skin, and their eyes are tired.

The crews that make their way off the navy’s battered ships look significantly worse. Naval officers trudge down the docks in waif-like, lifeless lines, their wounds haphazardly treated and still oozing blood. Doctors and medics, scattered amongst the thin crowd, step forward, ready to inspect those who look the worst. The rest are sent either to bed or to one of Cloud City’s medical facilities.

The _Alderaan_ does not return to port. She remains, burning, in Cloud City’s bay. The General Leia Organa arrives on the ship _Black Hawk_ , supported by Captain Poe Dameron. Her left leg has been lost to cannon fire, and there are new scars scattered across her body.

Poe Dameron is unharmed, save for his cuts and bruises. Citizens whisper about this golden man as he passes them by – is he real? Is he cursed? Is he something like Snoke? Then, he offers them a tired smile, and the worst of their fears are abandoned.

The pirate ship _Libre_ is among the last to return to the docks. Lady Phasma sends what remains of her crew onto the docks and glares at the city medics until they are treated. She, herself, arrives at one of the medical facilities covered in blood later that night, but the medic who wipes it away finds her unharmed.

She has Kylo Ren attached to her wrist by a charred length of rope. The knots are strong, but everyone who he passes by expects him to break free at once. Those who are close enough to see his eyes pull back. They are not the eyes of a living man, they say, spreading whispers through the crowd. They are the eyes of the dead.

There is a bag tied to Phasma’s waist, black and bloodstained. The same medic who wipes her clean goes to remove it from her body only to have her hands slapped away. Phasma does not apologize. “This bag is meant for the General,” she says, her voice thin from screaming. “No one else can have it.”

The bag contains the head of one Elijah Snoke. It is out of revulsion and not respect that his pale eyes have been forced closed.

Finn Freeman is the last to stumble off of the _Libre_. His eyes, many say, are the same as Kylo Ren’s, though his face and hands and body are covered with gunpowder. There are bruises on his skin and cuts on his hands; the tips of his fingers have been burned, and it is entirely possible that he has a concussion. The medic who attends to him has him transferred into the care of one of the General’s best doctors, who puts him on bedrest and refuses to let him move.

Finn does not want to move. He simply does not care to.

*

Rey’s body is limp in his hands, her midsection covered in blood and her eyes staring upward. Her breath is coming rapidly, and Finn knows, instinctively, that she does not have long to live.

There are tears streaming down his face, but he does not feel them. Phasma is kneeled at Rey’s other side, her face blank but her eyes equally full.

Rey looks between the two of them and smiles. “You did good,” she says with a ragged cough. “I’m – I’m proud of the both of you.”

When she coughs again, it’s to spatter blood across Finn’s face. He does not move to wipe it away.

Then, Rey looks away. She reaches out, past Phasma, with a blood spattered hand. Finn sees pain on Phasma’s face as she drags Kylo Ren’s unconscious body forward the scant inches Rey needs to touch him. She leaves a stain of blood on his unresponsive hand.

“Don’t kill him,” she says – pleads. Then, she falls silent.

Finn watches as she takes her last breath. The world around him goes dead in the same moment she does.

Then, there is nothing.

*

They bury her at sea, wrapped in the _Libre_ ’s battle-worn flag.

*

Phasma takes her place at the helm and orders what remained of the crew to take them back to shore.

*

Finn stays with Kylo Ren until he wakes. He tells the man what happened. He watches the shadow captain break.

*

When Finn wakes – days after the battle, his head aching and his mouth full of cotton – it is to find Poe Dameron waiting at his side. The other man does not hesitate to take his hand when he sees him open his eyes. He holds it to his cheek and swears, then and there, never to let the other man out of his sight again.

Finn smiles and allows it.

***

Days after the battle, when the port of Cloud City goes dark with night, Kylo Ren slips free of his bonds, escapes his mother’s prison, and goes out to stand at the end of the long, empty docks. The _Libre_ remains in port, her crew the guests of his mother as the Royal Navy celebrates their victory.

Kylo does not have to sneak in order to board it.

He traces the lines of the still-broken deck, following the railing with ungloved hands. He takes the steps up to the helm one at a time, each movement more painful than the last.

The wheel of the ship creaks under his hands. He holds it, firm, and imagines her standing there. There is a scrap of white fabric still in his pocket, only now it is bloodstained, never to be clean again.

There are no tears on his cheeks.

What few windows in Cloud City are lit belong to sleepless citizens. They are stars against the black of night. Kylo looks at them for a long time, then turns away. He walks to the  _Libre_ ’s stern and casts his gaze, instead, at the sea.

He does not hesitate.

He does not care.

He falls.

***

Tibanna Bay, in the books of history, becomes a place known for its greatest victory. Tibanna Bay, in the diaries of Leia Organa – in the journals of Finn Freeman, in the memories of Captain Phasma and the crew of _Libre_ – becomes a cemetery.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ((I'm sorry.))


	15. Arc V: And Begin Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or does it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This ending did not exist in the original draft of the story. However, in light of recent events, I couldn't stand to leave this story without a...sort of happy ending.
> 
> Sorry for what I did, folks. Hope I haven't hurt any of you too badly. Your comments have meant more to me than I can possibly say, and I'm so grateful that you came along on this ride with me.

Rey wakes to the smell of salt water burning through her nose.

She jolts upwards, gasping. The world is hazy white, just a little too off, but there’s a familiar rolling sensation beneath her feet that soothes her, somewhere beyond the immediate panic.

A pair of hands come down gently on her shoulders. Rey reaches up, touches them, and blinks, trying to clear her vision.

“Rey? Rey, dear one, it’s okay. Deep breaths. You’re okay, dear; it’s okay.”

The world shifts, stuttering from white back into familiar color. The hull of a ship swims into muddy view. Rey’s heartbeat slows. The hands on her shoulders flex, familiar, while the reassuring mantra repeats itself, low and soothing. Rey winds her fingers through her companion’s and closes her eyes.

When she opens them, the world is clear.

“Ben?”

Ben’s wrinkles have tightened into a young, clear face, and his hair is no longer white but burnished copper. Rey squints at him and sees the old man behind the young, for no matter his age, Ben’s eyes remain the same.

“Ben!”

She throws her arms around the man, pushing the breath out of his lungs as she effectively tackles him to the ground. He laughs and pats her on the back, murmuring soft ‘hellos’ into her hair. Tears track down Rey’s cheeks, though she does not feel them; she buries herself in Ben’s sea-worn shirt and lets herself be soothed, a child, red-faced with joy.

Behind Ben, a shadow shifts.

It catches Rey’s eye, so awkward in its movement. She forces herself upright and squints past Ben, into the darkness of the hull. The patch that’s separated itself from the rest keeps its head bowed low, frozen just a stone’s throw away.

Ben, still shuffling, looks back with her, and offers the shadow a kind smile.

Kylo Ren freezes.

Rey, one arm still wrapped around Ben’s shoulders, reaches out a hand.

Kylo’s shoulders slump. He hesitates.

After a heartbeat, he reaches back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> <3


End file.
